The European Union’s new ambassador to Australia has poured cold water over the Coalition’s plea to gut the $10bn-a-year free-trade agreement of its climate change goals by declaring the “deal’s done”, increasing the prospect the pact will struggle to be ratified by federal parliament.
But Lawrence Meredith, the former EU ambassador to New Zealand, said the pathway to achieving the Paris Agreement goal of net zero by 2050 was not prescriptive within the proposed FTA, allowing an Australian government freedom to chart its own course on meeting the ambition.
He also played down Australian farmers’ concerns about underwhelming market access under the pact, saying there would be an “eightfold increase in access for beef and a fivefold increase for lamb”.
“(Australian farmers) wanted more, but so did the car manufacturers of Europe,” he said. “We reached a deal that both sides concluded was as comprehensive, ambitious and balanced as possible.”
In an interview with The Australian two days after being sworn in as the EU’s ambassador in Canberra, Mr Meredith said ratifying the FTA would solidify the “shared values” of the two jurisdictions, building on dual support for net zero by 2050, tech regulation and the rules-based global order.
The Irishman said the EU supported the Albanese government’s push for Pacific nations to be free from Chinese coercion amid growing strategic competition in the region, likening it to Australia’s support for Ukraine.
“It’s really important that Australia is the largest non-NATO supporter of Ukraine. In the same way, the European Union wants a democratic rules-based Pacific,” he said.
“We want to work in partnership with Australia, who have leadership in this region, in support of a democratic rules-based Pacific. And this will be a very important part of my work.”
On the sidelines of the United Nations in New York last week, Anthony Albanese met with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and the two leaders welcomed the FTA deal struck in March and “looked forward to its signature as soon as possible”.
But with the pact needing to be ratified in parliament with the support of either the Greens or Angus Taylor, the Coalition is making any potential support conditional on the FTA being tweaked to delete references to climate action that would lock future governments into Labor’s “partisan climate agenda”.
Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Ted O’Brien told The Australian in May the Coalition opposed sections requiring the parties to “effectively implement” the Paris Agreement and mitigate “the risk of carbon leakage”.
Mr Meredith on Thursday said the climate provisions would not be taken out of the agreement, arguing it was simply stating the policies of both the EU and the Australian government.
When asked if a future Coalition government walking away from net zero would be a breach of the proposed FTA, Mr Meredith said: “Let’s deal with the world as it is now. Australia has an international obligation it entered into of its own accord.
“Australia is a great believer in the rules-based order, so I’m sure Australia is committed to meeting its own sovereign goals.”
He said “both sides had agreed to reference their joint and separate commitment to net zero by 2050”, but this did not tie a future government to Labor’s 62 to 70 per cent 2035 emissions target.
“How you get there, the nationally determined contributions, is entirely a matter for Australia to determine,” he said.
Mr Meredith said climate goals were an “integral part” of EU FTAs, while acknowledging they were “up to now” not typically included in trade deals struck by Australia. “For the people of Europe, that’s an important element,” he said
Mr Meredith said parliamentary support for the FTA would show “Australia and the European Union are speaking out loud and clear in favour of free trade, rules-based international order”.
