SUBJECTS: Nationals' meeting on climate change; Morrison Government failures on climate change; Australia as a renewable energy super power; advanced manufacturing in Australia; the importance of the resources sector in Australia.

MARCUS PAUL, HOST: Two minutes away from eight o'clock. Well, the Nationals have entered a marathon Party Room meeting on climate policy, but they've failed to land on a position. The four hours of discussion yesterday, Deputy Leader David Littleproud said they need more time to consider the Liberals' plan so they don't get, quote "screwed over again". Okay, well, Prime Minister Scott Morrison that'll certainly frustrate him, he confirmed on Friday he will attend the Glasgow Climate Change Conference. He needs as a minimum to be able to declare Australia embraces a firm 2050 net zero target. Rather than just having a plan to reach net zero without being absolutely locked into the date. While the Nationals are being given guarantees the regions will be protected, as well as offered largesse as part of a climate policy deal, they remain suspicious because they feel, as I mentioned David Littleproud before, that they've been dudded in the past. Anthony Albanese is the Federal Opposition Leader. Good morning, Anthony.

ANTHONY ALBANESE, LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY: Good morning.

PAUL: Are you surprised by this stalemate?

ALBANESE: Well, this is no longer a government. You have cabinet government in this country, which is the Government comes up with the decision. Everyone's locked in to support it. And then you have it announced. What you have here is the National Party pretending that they're not a part of the Coalition Government. Well, does this Government control 76 seats on the floor of the House of Representatives or not? This is a bizarre situation, whereby you have a clear indication that the Cabinet made the decision last week, and the Deputy Prime Minister of the country is pretending that he's not a part of it. And with Scott Morrison you see yet again, a failure to lead.

PAUL: What's the approximate percentage of the National Party vote here in Australia? It's certainly under what, ten percent?

ALBANESE: Well, it's well under ten percent. And the fact is that the country needs to move forward on this. This is about our economy, not just our environment, and action for climate change will be good for jobs. It will lower energy prices and make us more efficient, and it will reduce emissions and improve our environment. And you have from Scott Morrison, it doesn't matter what the issue. Whether it was, "I don't hold a hose, mate" during the bushfires. Or "it wasn't a race" to get vaccinated and to ensure supply of vaccines or to have purpose built quarantine. And here again, you have an example of just a couple of weeks before the Glasgow conference, the Prime Minister doing too little too late. Barnaby Joyce has said that there'll be no support for any increase in the 2030 targets, even though all of the state governments, if you up add up, just add up what they're doing, with 50 percent targets from New South Wales and Victoria, for example. It adds up to much more than 26 percent to 28 percent. Without the Federal Government doing anything at all.

PAUL: The concerns from regional areas is what I hear, particularly from Nationals. They say they're worried about jobs in regional Australia. How hard has it been to convince Barnaby Joyce, Matt Canavan and others who I mentioned, I think it's 4.51 percent. That's how much of the vote the Nationals have. It's almost like our climate change policy is being held hijacked to a very small minority, but they're very powerful. How can we convince them, Anthony Albanese, that jobs in regional areas like the Hunter, like in North Queensland, these mining communities, can be a part of a greener future with good paying jobs, low, low emissions, and of course, you know, decent electricity prices in the future.

ALBANESE: But the Nationals standing against climate change policy is like a quill salesman after the printing press has been invented, going around trying to sell their product and the world and the business community have moved on, which is why the Business Council of Australia and all of the mineral companies, BHP, Santos, Woodside, all of the big resources companies all support net zero by 2050. They understand that there are opportunities in the regions. Industries like green hydrogen will grow in the regions. Manufacturing will grow in the regions if we can decrease prices. One of the first visits I went to was to the Rio Tinto aluminium refinery there in Gladstone. I went there as Labor Leader. And what they told me was that they wanted to move to solar power. If they did, they thought that they could basically double their operations there because it would lower their energy prices. I mean, this isn't rocket science, There is no, no ban on building a new coal fired power station in Australia. The truth is that one hasn't been built under this Government or under the previous Labor Government because the market has spoken, because the cheapest form of new energy is renewable. And that's where the market is going.

PAUL: And you are going on about manufacturing, we should be, you know, focusing on our manufacturing capabilities here in Australia, we need to increase our manufacturing sector, we need new jobs in the industry, we need effectively to make things here again, Anthony. And the reason that we need to do that is because obviously, we want to be more self sufficient, cut out some of these overseas imports we've become so heavily reliant on. But the only way to do that, of course, is by having a climate policy that enables us to trade with overseas nations, who in turn will be able to obviously take advantage of Australia's increased manufacturing. You can't, we can't have increased manufacturing in this country in the longer term without a climate change policy.

ALBANESE: That's exactly right. And it makes absolute economic sense. And I want a future made in Australia. We're not resilient enough here. I want us, to see us manufacturing trains and buses and other transport infrastructure right here in Australia, not importing trains that don't fit the stations or are the wrong gauge in terms of light rail or ferries that don't fit under the Parramatta River bridge. I want us to make things here. I want us to add high value manufacturing and we can do it. Tritium in southeast Queensland is manufacturing the fastest electric vehicle charging stations in the world. Australian ingenuity. Australian science built by Australian workers giving income to Australia. It's just bizarre. I went to last week to a site in Smithfield, the G. James factory, they make glass and aluminium. A major employer in Chris Bowen's electorate. They have reduced their power bills by $250,000 a year by moving to solar, by making a difference. And that is making them more competitive. Everywhere I go business gets this and the National Party and Scott Morrison's Government are just dragging the chain here. Not only failing to lead, which is what government should do, they're failing to follow. And it is just a complete farce that you had yesterday, a four hour meeting with no outcome except that Barnaby Joyce has ruled out any change for 2030. That is any change while there is any prospect of anyone who's in Parliament now, making a difference. We won't be there in 2050.

PAUL: Yeah. All right. Just one final question just to make this as simple as possible. Have we become a little lazy? And when I say a little lazy, we've relied on just digging our minerals, coal or otherwise out of the ground and flogging it off overseas. And, and that's just been good enough. You know, we've made money, that'll do. Is that what a part of the problem is, is there a, from the incumbent current government? Is there just an unwillingness to perhaps take a slight risk for the future, because we just rest on our coal mining laurels if you like?

ALBANESE: Look, our resources sector has been very important for us, and we'll continue to export resources, but we can do so much more. Doesn't it make more sense, where it's possible, to not just dig something out, send it overseas and then buy it back once value has been added, to value add here. And we have resources like copper, like nickel, like lithium, that are in massive demand, that are increasing in value. We can be a renewable energy superpower for the world. We can be a high value manufacturing country. We can have such a bright future. But we've got to embrace the future, not be terrified of it. Not be scared of it.

PAUL: And you can't value add, Anthony, without a strong manufacturing sector. And that's been one of the biggest problems. And one of the biggest criticisms. Okay, great, we've got the minerals and the resources, we dig them up, we send them overseas, and we import stuff back, because we haven't value added to this important resource. What we need to do is stop sending it overseas, get the stuff out here, manufacture what we can out of it here in Australia, then export it, rather than, you know, sending it overseas and then importing it into the country at a higher cost. There's no value added there to any Australian.

ALBANESE: Well, that's right. And our resources will still be exported as well without value adding. But where we can, where we can let's extract the value from it here. Let's have a future made in Australia.

PAUL: Absolutely. All right. Always good to have you on, Anthony. We'll chat soon, appreciate it. 

ALBANESE: Thanks, Marcus. 

PAUL: A really important conversation, I think, on Australia's future. And it's not just about the climate change argument whether you're for or against. It's nothing to be alarmist about. It's not as if we're going to shut down our coal industry tomorrow, but we need to have a plan for the future. Otherwise, as I keep mentioning on this programme, and it's pretty obvious that we'll be left behind, my kids and future grandchildren can't be, can't afford to be left behind. Can yours? 

ENDS