The push back against net zero madness in Australia has begun in earnest and none other than Senator Matt Canavan has been at the forefront of that for quite some time along with some other good people, it must be said.

But Senator Canavan is taking that fight into the heart of the Liberal National Party, party room even as they have the fallout from their last election loss and they’re reforming and figuring out who they’re going to be into the future. Senator Canavan is leading the way in that particular fight and he joins me now on the Topher project. Senator, thank you so much for taking some time out of your day.

[From video] Thank you, Topher. Always good to be with you. [End video]

Now, your social media pages have been busy recently, and I recommend to anyone that doesn’t follow you yet that they do. So, I’m going to bring up a quick image here. Uh, you’ve been celebrating and talking a lot about the fact that net zero is being rejected state by state around Australia. Help people to understand what this means. There’s the federal party, there are the state parties. There are various nuances and layers to this. What’s being rejected and why?

[From video]

Well, look Topher, thanks uh thanks for the shout out. also recommend all your viewers follow you. I’m sure they probably already do, but tell your friends to do the same. Um, and so look, what we’ve been trying to do, well, for a number of years now, but there’s been renewed efforts since the election drubbing we suffered, uh, in May, uh, was to have all of our party units, our membership, uh, express their views on net zero. [End video]

Forgive me for interrupting this interview with Senator Matt Canavan. We’ll get back to him very, very quickly. But first, my name’s Topher Field. This is the Topher project and this is what I do. I help busy people like you to make sense of the nonsense and cut through the crap that’s coming from the mainstream media, from our politicians and bureaucrats and to be able to understand what’s happening in Australia and things like this. A bill to repeal net zero, what it means and what we can realistically expect to actually happen going forward. If you’d like to help the Topher project to to keep going, please do that by buying me a coffee at topherfield.net.

I do my best work when I’m angry and caffeinated. I’ll bring the anger if you bring the caffeine and you’ll get lots more content like this. But also, you can check out my best-selling books and my DVD. There’s Good People Break Bad Laws, Good Christians Break Bad Laws. There’s also Battleground Melbourne. You can watch that for free at battlegroundmelbourne.com if you’d like. But if you want it on your shelf, head over to goodpeoplebreakbadlaws.com and check out my merch there. Also, while you’re there, have a look at this Nyetzero design. Very topical for this interview. It’s how I say no to net zero. Nyetzero. It’s a great conversation starter when you wear it to barbecues and out of the house. If that’s your thing, if you’d like to be able to have conversations with people, this is a great way to get those conversations started. So, thank you for your support. And now, without further ado, let’s get back to Senator Matt Canavan.

[From video]

Before we signed up to net zero emissions as a federal parliamentary party room in 2021, there were no debates held by our membership. And in fact, there was not even a debate in the joint party room. It was just imposed by Scott Morrison. I’ve always felt that’s a massive failing. We’re a grassroots organization. We do best when we design policy and our elections all from the grassroots up from the ground up. And so I’ve been leading a charge the last few years to let the members have their say on this very important issue. Finally, that has happened in most uh states uh across the country and every time it’s gone to a vote, surprise surprise, it’s been comprehensively rejected. That is net zero has been comprehensively rejected by our party members.

Now, it’s important to note that this is by the membership of the party. Unlike the Labour Party, a vote of the membership does not bind the parliamentary party room. That’s always been the case. It’s nothing new here in terms of net zero. It’s now up to us in in the parliamentary party room to take those views forward. It does help having these membership views expressed. Uh and now we’re we’re trying to have the same debate in our parliamentary party room. That’s the next step. [End video]

Yeah. You know, I of I so often hear people saying to me and lamenting to me really, why don’t we have, you know, more good politicians? Why don’t we have more politicians out there? And of the politicians that we do have that are good, why can’t they make more of a difference? And typically the first thing I say back to them is because they need backup. They need that collateral, the party room support or popular support or petitions or various other things uh that can help you to be able to step into the the the parliament or step into the party room and carry those views forward.

Look, it is very exciting though because this felt like a debate we couldn’t even have just a few years ago as you say. Uh Scott Morrison signed on unilaterally. Another one of his captain’s picks, so to speak, in my opinion. Uh but now you’re actually taking a bill before the Senate. Excuse me. Let’s get the correct picture up there. That one there. You’re actually bringing a repeal net zero bill before the Senate. Some people get a little too excited when these things happen, which means they get a little too disappointed when they don’t necessarily work out. Uh, correct me if I’m wrong, Senator, but you’re not necessarily expecting this to get the support of the Senate right here and now. This is more of a long-term tactical play, but please correct me if I’m wrong.

[From video]

Well, Topher, you’re right. I mean often when we move things like private centers bills it’s more about the journey than the destination where uh it’s very very rare uh for to have a private senators bill actually pass because the parliament is typically uh controlled by the government uh and in this case the senate as well is controlled by the labor and greens party they have a majority so I don’t think the labor or greens party are going to be voting for my bill anytime soon and if that’s not the case the bill won’t pass.

But that being said, as you’ve probably seen with Barnaby Joyce moving the same bill in the House of Representatives, uh the very fact of moving the bill has moved the debate. Uh it’s captured media attention. More people are talking about it. So that’s why I talk about the journey. Like we’ve got to build momentum here for what is a major policy change. We have to keep in mind that there are a lot of people invested substantially invested in seeing this net zero agenda continue.

There’s a lot of money involved and always follow the money, right? A lot of people invested in renewable energy. A lot of people invested in carbon credits. A lot of banks think they can make you see dollar signs being able to make money off the trading of another effectively financial product albeit an artificial one invented by governments. Uh and so that opposition is substantial and overcoming that is not as simple uh as as simply you know stating your view on social media. We got to keep up momentum. Uh we got to reach muzzle velocity here to get rid of of this craziness. So that’s what we’re all trying to do. They’re all steps in that direction. All the people that are supporting and sharing this stuff on social media, you all make a contribution.

It’s just, you know, we have a joke sometimes. I used to joke that I think this media release is the one that’s going to take down the government. You know, it never works like that. There’s no silver bullet that gets rid of a bad government. It just takes a lot of hard work and grind among thousands of people uh to change a country. [End video]

No, that’s very very true. Now, one of the things that used to get said a lot about net zero by its supporters was, “What’s the worst that could happen? What if it turns out that we’re wrong about climate change?” Well, oh dear, all we’ve done is create cleaner energy and this abundant clean energy future. They they were talking as though there was no downside to this and therefore we should just do it by default. But yourself and many of your colleagues in in Parliament in the Nationals Party as well as many other good Australians have been pointing out that really that’s not actually true at all. Could you give us just a little bit of a rundown of some of the outcomes of your real productivity summit which I applaud by the way? Uh look that up online if you don’t know about Senator Canavan’s real productivity summit. Uh tell us a little bit about what’s really happening as a result of this transition to renewable energy.

[From video]

Yeah, it’s a great question to think that’s why we’ve got this wind in our sales now. The principal reason uh that there is a a move a mood against net zero now is because the people pushing net zero made a bunch of promises that have not come to fruition.

And ultimately we should we should judge the uh the merit of a policy based on its consequences based on its fruits not based on its intentions. So there’s too much right now too much wishful thinking in Australian public policy. The idea that oh we just got to have good intentions. We want to help the environment. We want to change the temperature of the globe. That’s enough uh for it to be justified. Well, no. Actually, what is important is what are the consequences for the Australian people of a certain policy.

And since we’ve adopted net zero emissions, uh power prices and our electricity prices and gas prices are up 40%. Can you believe it? In just 3 years, 40% that’s from the ABS. Uh and we’ve lost our nickel industry. We were promised these critical industry jobs. We’ve actually lost nickel. We’ve lost urea, the most important fertilizer. We’ve lost plastics, lost architectural glass. The glass that’s out the front of parliament. We can’t make that in Australia anymore. If we had to rebuild our parliament, we have to import that from other countries. It’s absolutely absurd in a country with so much resources now that how dependent we’ve become on other nations, including by pursuing net zero.

So, at my real productivity summit, that was really started because the the fake one and the fake one the government put on was happening just downstairs uh in the cabinet room. uh they didn’t even mention electricity prices in the productivity paper that Treasury had prepared for the conference. I mean it is absolutely remarkable. I mentioned the 40% increase in power prices since net zero. We’ve actually had a more than tripling of electricity prices in the last 20 years. We’ve over that period we’ve had stagnant productivity growth. And you don’t need an economics PhD to understand that if you massively increase the cost of energy, which is pretty much the cost of making everything, your productivity, your ability to make things at a certain cost is going to fall.

And that’s exactly what’s happened in our country. So it’s not surprising. But they just ignored it. Massive elephant in the room that they couldn’t fit in the cabinet room. So we invited that elephant up to the Senate committee room just a level above them in the parliament. And we were happy to talk about it. And we had great economists, former chairman of the productivity commission Gary Banks, former assistant treasury secretary David Pearl, lots of other eminent people go through the numbers here and outline in detail how particularly energy and I want to highlight something Gary Banks I think very uh uh very uh perceptively uh said was that typically Australia has been able to offset its higher labor costs by having cheaper energy costs. In effect, we’ve been able to afford dear wages by having cheap energy. And that era has come to an end now. And we’re seeing the consequences of that. And ultimately ultimately, if our productivity stays where it is, we won’t have we won’t have dear wages. We won’t have good wages for the Australian people or not as high as we used to. Uh because we’ll have to they’ll have to be lower to offset now the high energy costs being imposed on us. [End video]

Yeah, elections certainly have consequences and we’ve we’ve had it good for reasons that we clearly haven’t fully understood and now, as you say, we’re undermining those very things that made our quality of life as good as it was for so long. There is one last thing in the tale I want to touch on before I let you go, Senator, and that is the reliability issue. One of your colleagues recently gave a speech in Parliament, which you posted to your socials, and again, I recommend people follow your socials to keep up to date with exactly this, where we now have documented evidence. It’s no longer a conspiracy that renewable energy is making Australian electricity supply less reliable. That is now actually a matter of record.

[From video]

That’s right. That was from the New South Wales Parliament. I think the one you’re referring to, West Bank, great member of the upper house there in New South Wales. uh hidden in the footnotes of almost every official uh energy electricity plan uh or or report at the moment is this detail uh that the lights are at greater risk of switching off now thanks to the ridiculous obsession we’ve had with intermittent energy, not energy that can stay on all the time. Uh this is not as I say it’s not something you’ll hear uh directly from the energy ministers around the country typically but buried in these reports are the the shocking details that our electricity grid simply is not as reliable as it used to be.

And this is goes back to my fundamental problem with net zero emissions by 2050. Once we set a particular target with a specific date, we are prioritizing that target over all other objectives in our electricity system including including just the basic ability to keep the lights on. So we are obsessed about pumping in this intermittent unreliable energy to such a degree that we’re putting at risk our ability just to keep lights on for people, keep hospitals running, keep critical infrastructure running, keep critical industries going that cannot afford to have interruptions. We forget about data centers. We won’t have about have data centers. They have to have absolutely 100% always on energy. We’re putting all of that at risk because of this one target. And I think we’ve got it all ass about here. We should be of course the primary target of any electricity system should be to provide reliable electricity. That should be number one and usually it has always traditionally been. And then number two actually just below that should be the cheapest power prices for Australians. I think the the objective after reliability, the primary objective of our electricity system, it should be to deliver the cheapest power prices for Australians. And then after that, we can look at becoming cleaner, greener, all these other things. But as I say, we’ve got it all the wrong way about. And then we’re getting predictable consequences as a result. [End video]

Yeah. Well, Senator, I applaud your efforts as I’ve said before and I I want to continue to moderate people’s expectations. The fact that you’re introducing a bill doesn’t mean that the fight is almost won. The fight is very much on and it will drag on for quite some time. But I’m deeply grateful to yourself, your colleagues and also some other notable people in parliament and uh in you know in in various places of power and and influence around the country who are trying to rid us of this net zero nonsense. Senator, thank you so much.

[From video]

Thanks everybody else for their support too, Topher. It’s really important to keep up keep up the fight. Not just down to me, not just down to you. Everybody out there can make a difference. [End video]

Absolutely. And thank you for joining me on the Topher project.

[From video] Thanks, mate. [End video]

That was Senator Matt Canavan talking about his bill to repeal net zero. It is just one part of a much bigger war. Let’s not ease off. Let’s not pretend that the war is over or that the battle is almost won. That’s not the case. This is just another very important but nevertheless just another tactical step forward in that journey. My name is Topher Field. This is the Topher project. You can help me to keep going by buying me a coffee via the button at topherfield.net.

And also do make sure you check out my bestselling books about civil disobedience. Good People Break Bad Laws, Good Christians Break Bad Laws, If you’re into theology, that’s the theology of civil disobedience. Battlegroundmelbourne.com, my DVD, multi-award-winning, 14 awards around the world. And also a full range of merch, including this net zero design, the original, and also the updated Good People Break Bad Laws designs, and much more in t-shirts and hoodies. All available at goodpeoplebreakbadlaws.com.

Thank you so much for watching to the end. The algorithm loves you and so do I. Please like. Please comment where you think this fight is going and how many more years are left before we can finally kill off this net zero monster once and for all. Make sure you’ve subscribed to my channel. I’m up over 106,000 subscribers on YouTube. So, thank you to everybody. Let’s keep that number growing.

And as always, think free.