PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd will head to the Reef off Port Douglas with his Climate Change Minister Penny Wong today to see first hand the effects of global warming.
After jetting into Cairns aboard an RAAF aircraft from Darwin about 4.30pm yesterday, the PM received a rock star welcome from more than 250 party faithful, civic and industry leaders at a packed function at the Pacific International Hotel last night.
And after using his pre-election visit here nine months ago to launch his $200 million Great Barrier Reef rescue plan on Green Island, Mr Rudd has again chosen the Far North and the future of its reef to sell the urgency of his new carbon emission reduction scheme.
"Here is where the two worlds collide and intersect," he told the crowd last night.
"If we don’t act on climate change, the real consequences here of this great asset given to us from times past, from times beyond even the Dreaming of our indigenous brothers and sisters, the Great Barrier Reef … effectively disappears through the process that has been described as coral
bleaching."
In her address, Ms Wong highlighted the region’s vulnerability to climate change through rising sea levels and rising sea temperatures.
"We know that with a 3C increase in temperature what happens to the Great Barrier Reef; it’s about 97 per cent bleached and we know the enormous regional economic consequences of that happening," she said.
Mr Rudd stressed how hard Leichhardt MP Jim Turnour was working.
"This guy is both a terrier and a Trojan," he said.
"He is out there, bit between the teeth, at it, never stops, in your face, in your ear … and that was before the election.
"Now he’s doubly in your face and trebly in your ear."
