COREN: Prime Minister, earlier this year you were concerned that Copenhagen could fail. Is that still the case?
PM: Well, I don't believe we can allow the possibility of failure if we're serious about the planet's future. On the mechanics, though, of this negotiation, it's tough, it's hard, but I think in recent times, because of Prime Minister Rasmussen's leadership as the President of the Conference of Parties there is now a real possibility that we can craft an operational framework agreement, a Copenhagen agreement, which has got substance on all the key challenges - temperature, targets, commitments, finance, technology. That's what we're working towards, but the going will be tough.
COREN: So you're talking about an agreement, but what about a legal, binding agreement?
PM: Well, let's look carefully at the words used by Prime Minister Rasmussen himself. What he's talking about is one agreement in two steps. First step is, let's call it a heads of agreement about the core policy agreements across targets for bringing down greenhouse gas emissions, for verifiable actions by developing countries and concrete proposals agreed on finance, as well as technology.
Step two is translating all those into legal documents, and I know enough about the process, and other like processes, to know that's a really tough, techo task which takes a little bit of time.
The hard bit, though, the hardest bit, is getting the core policy agreements right. That's what we're striving towards at Copenhagen. I'm very encouraged by recent statements by President Obama, both in Singapore the other day when I was with him there, subsequently in Beijing with President Hu Jintao. The Chinese are also open to this process as well.
So I believe we've got a chance of landing a reasonable outcome.
COREN: How many leaders are on board?
PM: Well, that's building, but my most recent understanding is that we will have at least 50 leaders from around the world attending, and I understand the number is growing. You see, we don't want to allow a bureaucratic or negotiators impasse at the technical level to get in the road of what I'd describe as a leaders-driven, political leaders-driven, core agreement on the core policy questions of how we actually bring down greenhouse gas emissions for the future and save the planet.
COREN: And what sort of targets are you talking about, because the goal posts just continue to keep on moving?
PM: Well, the science tells us this: we have to aim to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions at something like 450 parts per million in order to prevent temperature rises exceeding two degrees Celsius. That's where the science points us. Therefore, everything should after that occur within the science.
What actions are needed to be taken then by the world's developing economies to bring that about? Targets by 2020, targets by 2050 and actions, also, verifiable actions, by the major emerging economies as well, including China and India. Put that together, together with the money to make it work, climate change finance to make it work for the developing economies, particularly those least able to fend for themselves, I think you have the architecture of a possible deal.
COREN: So you will come out of Copenhagen, you're quite sure of, with some sort of agreement?
PM: Well, can I say that I cannot make a final prediction on behalf of all my colleagues. There's likely to be a few of them there. Therefore, I can only speak as Prime Minister of Australia, one of the friends of the chair. The Danish Prime Minister appointed three of us to begin with, including the UN Secretary General and President Calderon of Mexico, but our view is that we have a strong possibility of bringing this about. If that was not the case then I wouldn't be exerting the effort I am currently exerting and other leaders are now exerting to try and break the impasse and produce the deal.
COREN: But there was so much expectation as far as Copenhagen is concerned. I mean, there still is a lot of expectation, but if you don't walk away with a legal, binding agreement, what have you achieved?
PM: Well, I think what you're doing is almost setting up a straw man there, which is, what's critically important here? The absolute core of a policy agreement between all the principle economies of the world which represent the vast bulk of greenhouse gas emissions, which is then translatable into a legally binding agreement, or saying that we have to produce a legally binding agreement upfront. All I know is policy precedes treaty. You've got to get the policy right, everyone agrees with that, then you translate it into a treaty document.
So I'd caution you and your colleagues in the international media for using this, I think, straw man, I think an artificial benchmark, really, of saying success or failure hinges entirely upon whether there is a 7,000-page long legally binding treaty with nice leather folders around the outside as the only benchmark of success. I would see a core, tight agreement on the central policy differences now on the science, if you like, on the question of temperature increases which are acceptable, two degree Celsius; on the targets for those us in the developed world; on the verifiable actions necessary for the big economies like China and India and others; as well, critically, as the climate change finance necessary to make this deal happen.
If get that right, part two is, frankly, doable. You don't get part one right, part two is never doable, so I simply that as clearly as I can to change your framework for analysis.
COREN: Well, as far as framework or timeframe goes, how long will it be before we do have a legal, binding agreement and everybody's signature is on that document?
PM: My expectation would be, my hope would be, that if we can get to a core operational framework agreement at Copenhagen, a Copenhagen agreement, that would be, therefore, able, in the course of 2010, to produce the legally binding treaty document. That is the logical sequence which would be embraced. Of course, this would be finally resolved by leaders once they gather in Copenhagen itself, but that's the logical, two-step process.
COREN: Domestically, are you concerned about how these targets will affect people, your voters, here in Australia? I mean, you have an election coming up next year.
PM: Well, I'm concerned about many things. This forms part of a very long list, but can I say, when it comes to climate change, one - I was elected by the Australian people to act on climate change. This country, Australia, is one of the hottest and driest continents on Earth, where the impact of climate change will be felt first and hardest. We have a national interest to act here, as do all the other economies and countries of the world, for different sets of reasons.
Secondly, therefore, we must act nationally and globally to be effective. Nationally, through the passage of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, our own cap-and-trade system in Australia, which is currently before the Australian parliament, and we're working like fury to negotiate a possible deal with the Opposition parties who control the Senate in the Australian parliamentary process, but the other part is global action. That's where the Copenhagen agreement is also essential. We have been charged by the Australian people to act in both these directions. You know something? It's tough, it's hard, it's politically controversial, but can I say this about the climate change sceptics and deniers around the world: how can they possibly look at their kids, in their eyeballs, and say that we should not act.
It is grossly irresponsible to simply have this evidence in front of you and to believe that we have some moral option available to us simply to remain inactive and hope that somehow it sorts itself out in the fullness of time. It won't. We are required to act, and I am almost as disgusted with those who run this sort of campaign, that the science is somehow in doubt, as I have been in earlier times with those who ran the same sort of campaign on the linkages between smoking and lung cancer.
The science is clear. The moral imperative lies in action.
COREN: Prime Minister, thank you.
PM: Good to be with you.