LNP senator Matt Canavan who used to love cosplaying as a miner while resources minister, has remembered he is, in fact, an economist.

He has a bit of a chat about the senate motion he has put forward for debate tomorrow –

The current health and future of the Australian metals manufacturing industry including the alumina, aluminium, lead, zinc, copper and nickel industries, with reference to:
(a) the impact of increasing energy costs, technological change, industrial relation regimes, workforce challenges and the
broader regulatory environment;
(b) distortions in global supply chains that impact the viability of Australian metals manufacturing;
(c) the cost of metals manufacturing businesses meeting climate change targets;
(d) the viability of government interventions to sustain Australian metals manufacturing;
(e) the potential for energy investments to help reduce costs for Australian metals manufacturing;
(f) the viability of further public-private partnerships;
(g) the impact on regions, our national security and economy if metals manufacturing declines in Australia; and
(h) any other related matter

(The motion is basically just ‘net zero is killing us, let’s have a committee about it’ in a sheep suit)

But then some questions start getting a little tricky and Canavan ends the press conference, with all the Nationals filing in behind him. If you have ever seen a sheep change direction and take the flock with it, that’s the image they seem to be going for.

The question that ended it all? If the Liberals decide they want net zero, then where is the future for the Coalition to remain a Coalition?

Canavan:

I don’t talk in hypotheticals. I think, I think, look, my position, my position, is very well known, of course. I mean, I think what would be good post election is we all have those conversations in the joint party room, and hopefully that will happen at some point. We’ve had difficult issues like this before in the last decade in my time here, and they’re always the sky’s Chicken Little sky falling in type conclusions made. But we find a way. We find a way. We find a way.