Climate change

2016-11-10

MR BARBER (Northern Metropolitan) — The election of President Trump represents the last gasp of the angry white guy.

[Speech was interrupted.]

Mr BARBER — It sounds like we have a few in this chamber. They just do not understand how the world works anymore, because they are no longer the boss of the household, they are no longer the boss of the media outlets, they are not running the big institutions, they are not running the world and they just do not understand how the world works anymore. So it appears not so much that they came out for Trump but that a whole range of other groups stayed home for Hillary, and that is how this has happened.

But there is one very pressing and very serious matter, where the world is going to go significantly backwards, and that is in terms of a response to climate change, because President Trump is determined to shatter the global consensus that was achieved in terms of action on climate change. He will not be able to satisfy what his army of burst saveloys would like to see, and that is that he could by edict, like King Canute, simply order that global warming disappear. It will come on relentlessly; there is nothing he can do about it. But the next four to eight years of course are a crucial period for action, and unfortunately this is a major setback.

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