As Australian bushfires rage beyond anything witnessed in our history, homes and temperature records go up in smoke, Scott Morrison finally returned to Australia from a family holiday and into his own personal firestorm. Commenting, "I can't hold a hose mate", you'd have to wonder if his PR machine hasn't recently been advised by Amanda Thirsk.While not wanting to diminish the very real implications of Australia's Prime Minister telling us to get on and watch the cricket instead of making links among climate change, high temperatures, drought and bushfires, Scott Morrison will go down in history as being the first Australian Prime Minister to literally leave the country and go on holidays in the middle of one of the most indescribable crises in Australia's history. (One of those ex Prime Ministers even managed to join the fire fight.)Whether you believe in climate change or are simply acting like a prime ministerial ostrich, it's not exactly a big leap of faith to understand that soaring temperatures, out of control fires, hundreds of homes and many lives lost is #notbusinessasusual.Still, it's heartening to guess, with Morrison's return, that there have to be at least 20 PR boffons and advisors sweating this one out right now in the basement of parliament. And the temperature in that room has nothing to do with climate change.
It turns out that running the country is a complex business and no matter how good your slogan or ordinary bloke self invented nickname coupled with some impressive electioneering manoveures, people actually expect you to do a bit more than say giddy up, I am off to Hawaii. See you when I get back. I'll say a prayer.They expect you to look after them. Keep them safe. Show care for their future. And not go on holiday when things go horribly wrong.
We enter 2020 surrounded by fire, heat, air we can't breathe and in a climate that feels awfully like heartlessness. David Ritter, Greenpeace CEO is calling it our Chenobyl moment (or at least hoping it is) and you'd hope he's right. When things get this bad, one can only hope this is a turning point. It is fair to say that the situation we are in is not Morrison's doing. You don't get here without the careful work of those before you. Despite all the warnings, we have been failed by the many prime ministers before Morrison, each of whom failed to act. Political and self interested spin have been our daily diet for years, but the propped up legitimacy of both is fading like the sunset as here we are - the global dunce of the Climate Change Performance Index, ignoring our drowning neighbours and being dumped by the financial community as a responsible investment. We are literally on fire, in drought, falling out of international investment favour and sweltering with no end in sight. Whether we like it or not, this is Morrison's watch and we can only hope that whatever his motivation, he will act, at least enough to facilitate a clear passage for those who can make a real difference beyond saying a prayer and hoping God will save us. Australians don't like being seen as letting the team down. They don't like being let down and they don't like being patronised, especially with cricket or the weather. And then there is the well publicised God thing. God is important to many people, but not everyone thinks that we can pray our way out of this mess or that God will simply save us at some unspecified point. S/he might even think we have to solve our own problems. While one has to respect Morrison's beliefs, there are only 260,500 Pentecostals in Australia. That leaves a bit over 24,340,000 of us who are interested in other world views and what might happen if say, the Muslims, Agnostics or even the Extinction Rebellion are right about our planet management responsibilities. Earlier in 2019, Scott Morrison labelled those who criticised his religious beliefs:"IT'S DISGUSTING. THESE GRUBS ARE GUTLESS AND THEY'RE KEYBOARD WARRIORS IN THEIR MOTHER'S BASEMENT TRYING TO MAKE HEROES OF THEMSELVES."Well it seems that those gutless keyboard warriors, tapping away in Mummy's basement have just given Australia's Prime Minister and his advisors, in Parliament's basement, a lesson in what people care about around here. Giddyup Scott. We really need some actual climate action before it's too hot to play cricket.