Well this is certainly an interesting development...
The Sydney Morning Herald today reports:
"After the prime minister's office blocked Julie Bishop's proposal to travel to a global climate negotiation in Peru, she took the matter to a meeting of the full cabinet to get the decision reversed.
When the deputy leader of the Liberal Party and Minister for Foreign Affairs put the case to the cabinet, no one raised any major objection, according to informed government sources."
Julie Bishop is in Lima this week for COP20, which many diplomats are calling the best chance in a generation of striking a deal for real climate action.
This news comes after reports of the Foreign Affairs Minister went 'bananas' after the PM allegedly appointed a chaperone to attend the Lima COP with her for climate change negotiations. Read about it here.
Julie Bishop has also stepped up and called for “strong” greenhouse gas emission cuts by Paris 2015. Read about it here.
“We’ve got a very good story to tell on climate change,’’ Julie Bishop said . “We are committed to our 2020 target, which in fact is a 12 per cent reduction below 2005 levels. That is comparable with other developed countries and we believe we will reach it.’’
On Australia's lack of contribution to the Green Climate fund , Bishop explained: "Australia is already playing our part in what I believe is an effective international response through our direct national action and through our aid program.”
YESTERDAY we shared these findings from the Sydney Morning Herald: "Six out of 10 of Australians think Tony Abbott's Direct Action policy has left the country with an inadequate policy response to the problem of global warming, according to the latest Fairfax Ipsos poll."
"7% of Aussies think our PM is doing "too much" on climate change. The same number of Americans think Elvis is alive." - Stuart Khan @stukhan
Here's what some of you said:
Join in the conversation by clicking here.
GOOD NEWS from COP20
Here is some great news from the past week.
Germany's largest energy company, with 33m customers plans to drop #fossilfuels & #nuclear : http://t.co/ygFYmLD9Ni pic.twitter.com/VdspEmZwZA — Momentum for Change (@Momentum_UNFCCC) December 4, 2014
. @CFigueres : " #GCF has reached capitalization of $9.95 billion. I am confident we will reach target of $10 billion this week" . @GCF_News — UNFCCC (@UN_ClimateTalks) December 8, 2014
Thanks Norway for pledging $258 million to #GCF . Initial capitalization now $9.95 billion http://t.co/2cCncZWs0T #COP20 @GCF_News — Christiana Figueres (@CFigueres) December 5, 2014
Peru is looking to lift its renewable #energy target from 46% to 60% over the next 10 years http://t.co/CzkaeV8fIA — RenewEconomy (@renew_economy) December 8, 2014
Stay tuned for more developments and exciting news from COP20!