Australia's Garrett makes Kyoto a priority

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Australia's Labor Party would urgently sign the Kyoto Protocol to curb global warming and overturn the country's decade of opposition to the pact if it wins elections, Labor's environment spokesman Peter Garrett said.

The move would further isolate the United States ahead of December's international climate meeting in Bali, which will discuss a new framework for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions beyond 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol expires.

Garrett, a former rock star, is set to become Australia's Environment Minister if Labor wins power at elections due within weeks. He said Australia would then send a signal that it wanted to play a key role in post-Kyoto negotiations.

"We certainly can ratify as a first action," Garrett told Reuters in an interview on Monday. "We're certainly committed to immediately ratifying the protocol.

Published opinion polls show the centre-left Labor Party has a commanding lead and is well placed to defeat conservative Prime Minister John Howard, who has been in power 11 years, at elections expected to be held in November or early December.

Both Australia and the United States have refused to ratify the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which sets binding limits on carbon emissions, blamed for global warming, in 35 developed nations.

Howard's government has said signing the Kyoto Protocol would unfairly hurt Australia's economy and status as the world's biggest coal exporter, while major emitters like China and India were not included.

Garrett said the Bali conference was a "turning-point meeting", and Australia needed to ensure it had full voting rights at the negotiations, which it would only have if it was part of the Kyoto pact.

"I think that ratification, and our participation will provide a needed boost to international climate change diplomacy," he said.

"It certainly would highlight the fact that those countries that were standouts were dwindling in number."

ROCK TO POLITICS

Garrett, 54, was the frontman and singer with rock band Midnight Oil for 25 years. One of Australia's most successful bands, Midnight Oil was known for its socially confronting lyrics for human rights and against war and environmental destruction.

But Garrett has always had a strong interest in the environment, and served as president of the Australian Conservation Foundation before he won a seat for Labor in parliament in 2004.

In a wide-ranging interview, Garrett said if Labor wins office, it would carry forward with any initiatives to emerge from the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate, known as the AP6.

The AP6 includes China, India, Japan, South Korea alongside Australia and the United States and is due to meet in India later this month. Canada has said it also wants to join.

The conservative government has announced plans to introduce carbon trading, which provides financial incentives to clean up pollution, by 2012.

Garrett said Labor would speed up the process. "We think it's possible to have a framework in place for a scheme to be undertaken by 2010."

Garrett remained optimistic about the world coming together to combat global warming, describing it as the ultimate challenge for leaders and one they could not fail.

"It's clearly a task that has to be addressed with an enormous amount of energy and vigor and urgency," he said. "But we've got the capacity to do it intellectually, morally and economically. We've just got to get on with the job."