With nine Greens in the senate and Adam Bandt securing a seat in the House of Representatives, could the ‘Green Slide’ be an opportunity for ‘multi
party democracy’?

On the eve of an election, Ben Sorensen caught up with the very busy and dedicated senator Bob Brown and asked him to reflect on where we have been and where we
are going….

Ben: Can you tell us about sustainable population growth and its impact on the environment?

Senator Brown: We need planning for population. The Greens have a plan for a national population enquiry to go to all rural, regional, and suburban areas as well as businesses and unions so we actually know where we are going. If we are going to have population growing, we need high speed rail between cities and light rail within cities and we need to be collecting money off the big mining companies when they make wind fall profits to help fund that.

Ben: There seems to be a fear that supporting the environment will cost jobs?

Senator Brown: That came from John Howard. He didn’t listen to perhaps the greatest economist in the world Sir Nicholas Stern from the World Bank who came and told him and the Press Club that those economies which are environmentally based are going to be the strongest this century. More recently, Noble Prize winner Prof Joseph Stiglitz (who has been in Australia) says you must have a carbon tax. Only the Greens show that responsibility.  We should change the taxation base and put the weight of it on to the polluters who create waste and people who use toxic materials and deplete our resources instead of putting it on to prosperity based enterprises.

Ben: What are your thoughts on Labour’s mismanagement of the Home Sustainability Assessment/Green Loans and Home Insulation programs?

Senator Brown: Pretty Horrendous but at the outset they should have had the nous to know that a Department of Environment is not a managerial consultancy organisation and there should have been the managerial expertise brought in from outside. I don’t think you have to be an expert in management to know that, but the government mismanaged it. It’s a great pity because the program, as outlined should have been implemented and rolled right out to every home in Australia to lower power prices and lower the impact on climate change. We’ll get back there… but it does require good management.

Ben: Why are people still sceptical about global warming?

Senator Brown: There is more common sense about global warming in the average class room than there is around the cabinet table. This is the hottest year in recorded human history. The Great Barrier Reef will be dead by mid century if the current trend continues. We should have a tax on carbon, Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott have abandoned it. The Nobel Prize winners say you should have it. The Greens are more economically responsible in an age of dangerous climate change.

After the recent results of the election, Bob Brown said that the Greens will use the vote from the Australian people responsibly; it will be used to build leadership, to innovate, create a better health system, save the forests, get a carbon price and create certainty for businesses in an age of climate change. “Greens will have the balance of power in the senate and we’ll put that to good use,” he said on election night.

Senator Bob Brown Leader of the Australian Greens, Senator for Tasmania. Senator Brown was born and educated in rural NSW and worked as a doctor before becoming the face of the campaign to save the Franklin River in 1982. He was elected to the Tasmanian state parliament in 1982 and over his ten year tenure notably achieved gun law reform, gay law reform and the expansion of the Tasmanian World Heritage area. In 1996, Bob was elected to the Senate, where he has led the national debate over the past 14 years on climate change, water, preventative healthcare, conservation, and human rights. His current term expires in 2014. He is a published author and acclaimed photographer.
www.bobbrown.org.au