Climate Change Policy:

Adaptation
Elise Tsang 2800322
4118ENV Climate Change Policy
3 November 2014

CONTENTS
1.0 Introduction

2.0 Key Climate Change Adaptation Issues in Queensland

3.0 Australian Constitution and Queensland Local Government Act

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4.0 Commonwealth Governments Role

5.0 Queensland Governments Role

6.0 Local Governments Role

7.0 Collaborative Governmental Approaches

8.0 Recommendations to Improve Policy Cycle

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9.0 Conclusion

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10.0 Reference List

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1.0 Introduction
Climate change is a universal issue being faced by the current
society, where the changes of climate are interfering with natural
behaviours and cycles of life. The changes in climate has shifted
significantly over the years, these results are due to the causes of
human activities (UNFCCC, 2014). Climate change is basically the
increase of gases (such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous

oxide) in the atmosphere is absorbed and re-radiated and cause the

increase of rising temperatures (also known as greenhouse gas
effect) (Ramanathan 1998, p.187). An increasing trend of population
growth is causing more human activities and production to cater for
the demands and is heavily contributing towards climate change
issues. Many countries have come together to develop treaties in
order to address the climate change issue and to generate baseline
standards and goals to be achieved by each country. Australias
three tiers of government play different roles to mitigate climate
change; these three levels are federal, state and local levels of
government. Queensland has recognised climate change issues that
will affect the future conditions of the state and requires the
collaboration of the three tiers of government in order to adapt to
climate change. This report will address what should be the role for
each of the three levels of government in Australia in helping
Queensland adapt to climate change.

Key Climate Change Adaptation Issues in Queensland

Queensland is known as Australias sunshine state where the
coastline is a very popular attraction and is where majority of the
development is located. The effects of climate change effecting
Australia include higher heat levels, rising temperatures, less
precipitation, rising sea levels and coral reef damage (Lerner, 2008);
these issues do not only affect Queensland but also Australia and
many other countries around the world. The importance of
developing frameworks to address the climate change issue is
crucial at these current conditions globally (Nursery-Bray, 2009).
The Queensland Government (2010) has estimated that the
population growth of Queensland will increase rapidly and the
majority in South East Queensland, being the currently fastest
growing metropolitan region in Australia since 2007 (McAllister et
al., 2013). The Queensland Government (2010) have also identified
key climate change issues that need to be addressed in Queensland;
these include: heatwaves, rising temperatures, cyclones, severe
winds, severe storms, hail storms, flooding, storm tides, bushfires,
landslides, coastal erosion, less precipitation and damaging
conditions of the natural environment.
The rises in sea level is one of the more important factors that 5
local councils of Queensland have recognised and prepared climate
strategies and action plans to address this problem (Brisbane,
Cairns, Gold Coast, Redlands and Sunshine Coast) (Zeppel, 2012).
Queenslands coastline is where most development is located and
rising sea levels will effect built development and property by
coastal erosion and flooding. In Australia floods have caused the
most damage financially approximately $300 million worth of
damages per year (Diane Keogh, 2011). Floods have affected many
industries in Australia and also businesses and residential housing.
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The consequences of flooding such as clean up and rebuilding is the

most costly stages and effects many businesses and residents. The
lack of rain will affect the agricultural industry significantly and
encourage harsh conditions to the environment causing bushfires.
These climate issues are all interconnected and Queensland being
the fastest growing state in Australia, action must be taken in order
to create a sustainable future for the coming populations.

Australian Constitution and Queensland Local Government

Act
The three levels of government in Australia are national,
state/territory and local, each level of government has different
roles and powers. The Australian Constitution specify the powers of
the federal government; for example Part V, Section 51 (xxix) states
that the federal government has power over external affairs
including the enforcement of international treaties such as the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
and the Kyoto Protocol. The Australian Government has accepted
the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol as benchmark standards and
national goals to mitigating climate change. All other powers that
are not specified in the Australian Constitution will be given to the
states and local governments to control. The Council of Australian
Governments (COAG) have agreed to the National Climate Change
Adaptation Framework in 2007, the framework guides all
governments to cooperate to address the key issues of climate
change through adaptation options with a mid-term agreement of 57 year period ending in 2014 (Australian Government, 2007). The
Australian Government has also other projects that are contributing
to the framework, these are:
CSIRO Climate Adaptation National Research Flagship,
Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility,
Australias Farming Future,
Caring for our Coasts,
National Coastal Vulnerability Assessment,
Forest Industries Climate Change Research Fund,
Local Adaptation Pathways Program,
Climate Change Adaptation Skills for Professional Program,
and
Water for the Future.
These projects have roles for each level of government and have
collaborative elements within the framework towards addressing
climate change.
The purpose Queensland Local Government Act 2009 is to outline
the powers and responsibilities of local governments of Queensland
and provide an accountable, effective, efficient and sustainable
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system. The state and local governments have more flexibility with
powers. The state government is able to guide all Queensland local
governments with uniform guidelines and local governments are
able to proceed to work within these guidelines unless approved by
the Minister. There are many local plans and frameworks (such as
the Local Adaptation Pathways Program) in progress to help
Queensland adapt to climate change.

Commonwealth Governments Role

The Australian Government is the overarching government body to
determine which international treaties to follow, and is responsible
for preparing an overall climate change adaptation framework in
order to have consistency in all states and territorys climate change
adaptation planning. These frameworks must be consistent to the
international treaties and be followed by the state and local
governments. The Australian Government has departments and
organisations that do research (e.g. Commonwealth Scientific and
Industrial Research Organisation CSIRO) and experiments to further
understand the processes and elements of climate change. The
commonwealth government should also raise awareness of climate
change and the effects it will have on residents and the
environment. Earth Day is an example of an international event that
is voluntary where households are aimed to turn off all electronics
for one hour per year. The Earth Day event has been advertised and
made aware to the majority of the Australias population and
households through television advertisement, posters in public
places, newspaper and web advertisements. The importance of the
commonwealth government to lead the recognition of climate
change mitigation is vital, this will provide more security for the
state governments and local governments to take action alongside
with the frameworks provided. Being the federal government, the
responsibility of collating all data is necessary to be able to predict
further progress and greenhouse gas impacts to the environment.
The federal government also needs to take responsibility of
determining which issues need to be prioritised in relation to
Australias conditions; this step may need to encounter the
cooperation with the state governments to gain more accurate data
before analysis. Each state may have different issues that are of
concern and will have different priorities and will need to be
considered by the federal government. The limitations on adaptation
plans of climate change will also need to be taken into
consideration. The population of Australia is on an increasing trend
and will mean frameworks and goals must be realistic and not
reduce too many resources at a time. Climate change is a long term
wicked problem (Head, 2008), which will need to have continuous
analysis, studies and monitoring to be able to slowly change the
current resource usage and operations.

Queensland Governments Role

Each of the states and territories of Australia will need to abide by

the frameworks provided by the federal government in accordance
to the circumstances and regulations of each state/territory.
Recently in Queensland the changes in election have impacted
Queenslands climate change policies and have therefore been
abandoned. The Queensland Government needs to have a set plan
where elections do not affect these climate change adaptation
policies. The need to have adamant legislation on climate change is
significant, as the climate change will not be prevented if no actions
are taken. This legislation will be more specific on which climate
change issues are needed to be addressed and generate policies
and more concise frameworks of the different types of management
is needed (e.g. coastal management, resource management, bush
management, agricultural management etc.). The Queensland
Government is able to use these different pieces of planning and
management frameworks to allocate local areas and regions to the
most suitable pieces. The South East Queensland Regional Plan
(SEQRP) is an example of the Queensland Government generating
regional plans for a region with the goals and objectives identified
for local governments to pursue. In Queensland the Department of
State Infrastructure and Planning (DSDIP) is the department that
manages the regional plans in Queensland include: Cape York,
Central Queensland, Central West Queensland, Darling Downs, Far
North Queensland, Mackay, Issac and Whitsunday, MaranoaBalonne, North West Queensland, South East Queensland, South
West Queensland and Wide Bay Burnett (DSPDIP, 2014). The
Queensland Government should take responsibility of climate
change adaptation awareness throughout the state and its
population.

Local Governments Role

In the past decade the recognition of the local government needing

to take a role in climate change adaptation was introduced (Ingrid
Baker 2012, pp. 127). The Australian Government have recognised
this and have expanded and given power to the local governments
to become part of the processes of climate change adaptation. The
local governments role should be to implement the regional plans in
accordance to further generate local plans and conducting these
plans into projects and actions. In Queensland, each regional plan
has at least one local planning scheme/s which are prepared by the
local councils. For example, the SEQRP has a number of local
councils within the region, Brisbane City Council being one of the
local councils and have prepared a Brisbane City Plan 2014. These
plans will address the problem of population growth (mainly the
Sustainable Planning Act 2009/Integrated Planning Act 1997
depending when it was created) and other relevant legislations. The
plans usually do not incorporate the climate change issues but
rather focus predominately on the growth of population and the
planning of land use and infrastructures. The local governments

should encourage other projects either mandatory or voluntary to

their communities to become more eco-friendly and aware of the
climate change issues and the effects in the future it will cause.
There are some plans that address the effects of the issues such as
the Climate Change Strategy 2009-2014 (Gold Coast City Council,
2009) which addresses the issues in the Gold Coast. This plan does
outline clearly the problems and effect it will cause in the area and
recognises the importance of mitigation and adaptation measures
as soon as possible, it also outlines the approaches the government
is aiming to take.

Collaborative Governmental Approaches

The collaboration of all three levels of government is currently being

practiced in attempting to implement climate change adaptation
policies through the National Climate Change Adaptation
Framework. The federal government have invested millions of
dollars into research and projects incorporating Australias
agriculture, coastline, biodiversity, fisheries, forestry, tourism,
health, infrastructure and natural disasters. This shows the initiative
and the importance of this issue by funding research and developing
information and tools to help generate the most efficient and
effective climate change policies. The Queensland Government will
use federal government frameworks to generate regional plans and
incorporate all aspects to the suitability of each region. The state
governments will also have many other supporting legislations of
significance to the issues of climate change and planning which
must be incorporated into each regional plan. The local planning
schemes follow the regional plans aims and objectives. These aims
and objective will be projected through local planning schemes and
projects.
The collaborative elements need to be incorporated throughout the
three tiers of government, rather than federal government
presenting a framework, state government adopting the framework
to generate regional plans and local government adopting regional
plans to generate local planning schemes. Collaborative elements of
the processes will need to be incorporated to deliver a more
appropriate, effective and efficient climate change adaptation
policies. By having a cycle rather than a linear process will allow for
the results to be monitors and then adjustments can be made to
better improve the current processes. The three levels of
government will be a primary stakeholder of the issue but also
involving and educating the general public, the different industries
and businesses will also prepare a better understanding of the
effects and climate change and the importance of taking action
sooner rather than later (Emerson & Gerlak 2014, p. 769).
Incorporating the public as a primary stakeholder and incorporating
them into the cause and effects of climate change, it will relieve the
stresses on the government (Howes & Dedekorut-Howes, 2013,

pp.9) while allowing the population to realise the input of human

activity towards the issue. McAllister et al. (2013) has suggested
that a successful climate change adaptation process will be created
by having informed and poised government, private sector and
community leadership with the help of community engagement that
will provide continuous awareness, training, education and capacity
building that is mutually agreed on by all parties. McAllister et al.s
theory will be an underlying goal that the federal government can
adopt, but will be very difficult to pursue in practice.

Recommendations to Improve Policy Cycle

Policy cycles have three main stages, these are thinknig doing and
testing (Althaus et al., 2012). The Australian policy cycle has eight
stages and has been used since 1998 in the public sectors for
training purposes (Althaus et al., 2012):
Identifying issues,
Policy analysis,
Policy instruments,
Consultation,
Coordination,
Decision,
Implementation, and
Evaluation.
A good process can help create better policy (Bridgeman & Davis
1998, p. 2), therefore recommendations are made to improve the
current policy cycle. There will be limitations on the policy cycle
approach, where observations will be taken to analysis where
patterns are foreseen and creating actions to these issues
(Bridgeman & Davis 2003, p. 98). Other limitations will include the
availability of science, technologies, resources flexibility of
regulations and the ability to meet the current and future demands
(Dovers 2013, p. 120).
Identifying Issues: Will need to prioritise and incorporate the main
issues affecting the certain region under analysis. The governments
are under pressure to identify the major issues, as there are
limitations to resources. In this process the incorporation of
stakeholders would be an ideal step to add because the population
will be the effected by the policies.
Policy Analysis: Will be the analysis of the issues identified and its
impacts to the environment and the community. This will include
research centres making future projections of the impacts caused
from the issues identified and will incorporate the growing
population into these projections while assuming science and
technologies stay as is at current conditions.

Policy Instruments: Need to keep in mind all the international

treaties that were agreed to and other important pieces of
regulations that needs to be followed. The main role will need to
determine which instruments will be the most effective and efficient
to address the issues. These instruments should be local community
projects, as the populations actions will help reduce the greenhouse
gas effect through everyday living activities.
Consultation: Should require the informing of the stakeholders of
what the findings are, and generate feedback from the public as well
as all levels of government even international organisations to
initiate ideas and further concepts and theories. This will then
require reviewing and incorporating major ideas into where possible.
Coordination: Of the plans will be outlined and discussed between
all levels of government and policy makers to generate options and
main goals and objectives. These options and aims should be made
aware to the public with transparency of all stages of the process in
order to gain good relations with the public and the government.
Decision: Will be made with the agreement of all government levels
and policy makers of the policies needed to address the identified
issues in the first stage of the policy cycle. This stage must inform
all stakeholders of the final decisions and future projections of the
proposed policies to enable full awareness of the public.
Implementation: Of the policies will need to be clear, effective,
realistic and reasonable in order to trigger potential adaptations to
climate change issues. Transitioning from the different stages of the
policies and projects will need to operate smoothly in order for the
public to be willing to take part of the policies.
Evaluation: Of the plans implemented is a significant step, to
develop a better understanding of the results and further determine
better options and identify new issues.

Conclusion
Climate change adaptation is a significant issue that requires
addressing on a global scale. The importance of the effects of
climate change needs to be expressed to the public to aware the full
consequences that will be detrimental to the natural and built
environment. This report has identified climate change issues within
Queensland and the powers that each level of the government
possesses. The report has also covered the roles they should play
and how the collaboration of all levels of government in Australia
will be able to address the climate change adaptation as effectively
and efficiently as possible through the actions of the population. The
policy cycle was analysed and recommendations were made to

improve current stages and suggest that human activities should be

regulated through policies and projects in order to mitigate these
issues.

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