The junior Coalition partner – which is bitterly divided on the issue – has put off a likely fierce debate on a net-zero target until a planned face-to-face meeting on October 17,warning they will not be pushovers on any net zero emissions pact.
Senator McKenzie singled out Mr Frydenberg,the member for the Melbourne seat of Kooyong,and Dave Sharma,who holds the Sydney seat of Wentworth,in her criticism as the debate over the target hits fever pitch within the federal government.
“It is easy for the member for Kooyong or the member for Wentworth to publicly embrace a net zero target before the government has a position,because there would be next to zero real impact on the way of life of their affluent constituents,” she wrote inThe Australian Financial Reviewon Tuesday.
“Our people,by contrast,are generally living in the electorates with the lowest per capita incomes,while the industries that underpin our regional economies are emissions-intensive. Not just in coal,but farming,transport,manufacturing,food processing and more.”
But Mr Sharma said climate change was a “practical and technological challenge” that all Australians had a collective interest in solving.
“I’m not interested in stoking a city versus country divide over this issue,or denigrating one group of Australians and setting them against another,” Mr Sharma said.
“Our national interest deserves better than this.”