Our economic future can only be secured by courageous energy policy

Australia's Chief Scientist has called for a 50 per cent cut in greenhouse pollution within 50 years. It can be done and it must be done.

If left unchecked, climate change will not only have severe environmental consequences, but negative economic and social ones as well.

Sir John Houghton, head of the scientific working group of the IPCC, the world's most prestigious climate change assessment body, has described climate change as a "weapon of mass destruction".

"Climate change can strike anywhere in any form," he says. "A heatwave in one place, a drought or flood or a storm surge in another. This is not a problem for the future. The 1990s were probably the warmest decade in the last 1000 years and 1998 the warmest year. Global warming is already upon us."

Australians want and need leadership on the environment. Sadly, we are the worst greenhouse polluters in the industrial world, even though our country is one of the most vulnerable to climate change. Without strong government leadership, climate change will negatively impact our economy, jobs, quality of life and human health. No major party has yet shown the courage to raise itself to this challenge. It is time that they did.