Even by the standards of state capture in Australia, the level of chumminess between the Western Australian Labor government and the fossil fuels industry is quite something.
Say what you want about prime ministers getting a chummy photo-op with Andrew Forrest, in WA they put out media releases about draft emissions reduction legislation complete with approving comments from the state director of oil and gas industry lobby Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association.
In the first three years or so they were in government, emperor Premier Mark McGowan, Regional Development Minister Alannah MacTiernan, Mines and Petroleum Minister Bill Johnston, and Environment Minister Stephen Dawson collectively met with with gas companies and lobby groups nearly 140 times. When ill-fated former opposition leader Zak Kirkup announced a $400 million renewable energy plan that would see coal phased out, McGowan, in the lead-up to the 2021 election, said it would mean “many many billions of extra debt, huge increase in family bills, rolling blackouts across the state and huge job losses”.
So perhaps the list of sponsors at the Premier’s Science Awards, which was held last night, shouldn’t surprise us:
We’re just disappointed that this year no one was deemed worthy of the “BP Deepwater Horizon award for services to climate science”.
