Albanese government not doing enough on climate crisis, majority of Labor voters tell poll

More should be done to prepare for the impact of heating, Climate of the Nation survey suggests, but certainty about the cause of extreme events falls

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A majority of Labor voters think the Albanese government is not doing enough to prepare for or adapt to the impacts of the climate crisis, according to a long-running national poll.

The Climate of the Nation survey of voters, now in its 16th year and managed by the progressive thinktank the Australia Institute, found 52% of ALP supporters think the government should be doing more to prepare for the impacts of climate-related extreme events. Only 26% said it was doing enough, 10% too much and 12% were unsure.

74% supported a “polluter-pays tax” applied to businesses based on how much they emit had 74% support

66% supported a tax on the windfall profits of the oil and gas industry 66%, up from 61% last year.

59% supported levy on fossil fuel exports to fund climate adaptation programs.

Answers on coal and gas mining were contradictory. Two-thirds of people said governments should plan to phase them out, and 53% supported a moratorium on new coalmines. But 46% said the benefits of coal and gas outweighed the negative impacts.

70% wanted coal-fired power plants to be phased out, compared with 79% a year ago. About a third – 34% – said they should be phased out by 2030.

An overwhelming majority (75%) suggested they were concerned the climate crisis would make insurance more expensive and disrupt supply chains so that it became harder to buy necessities.

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