Fiscal restraint or culture wars? Councils winding back climate action
By Rachael Dexter and Benjamin Preiss
Councils across Victoria are scaling back climate change commitments, removing the words “climate emergency” from key documents and, in some cases, scrapping programs.
Disputes over the language of climate change and how public money should be spent addressing it have erupted at inner-city Yarra, Merri-bek, Darebin and Bayside councils, as well as coastal and country councils.
Peter Cook, president of Queenscliffe Climate Action Now, on the eroding Narrows dog beach. Cook is concerned his council is moving to scrap its Climate Action Response Plan.Credit: Simon Schluter
The trend, in some cases driven by a new wave of more conservative councillors pushing for a “back to basics” agenda, has alarmed local environmental groups.
While councillors argue the change in tack is a necessary response to counter high inflation and stringent rate caps, critics say the move is driven by culture wars and reaction against progressive causes.
The five-councillor municipality of Queenscliffe Borough, which is reviewing its Climate Action Response Plan with a vote scheduled for next week, is among the most recent examples of this shift.
Following the 2024 local council elections, a progressive majority was replaced by a conservative bloc, including councillors who campaigned on a “back to basics” platform.
Tensions are running hot after the new council majority voted to remove references to protecting the natural environment and celebrating local Indigenous culture from the council’s “Community Vision”. They also refused to publicly release the community survey results which they claimed to be the basis for these changes.
Councillor Donnie Grigau – a Liberal Party member and former state Liberal candidate – argued the revised plan provided “a strong sense of place, responsibility and common sense”.
“We are not a municipality that needs grand slogans or vague commitments. What we need and what this vision delivers is clarity, accountability and a focus to get the basics right,” he said during a fiery July meeting.
The sole dissenting councillor, independent Isabelle Tolhurst, said she feared the changes were a precursor to scrapping the council’s Climate Action Response Plan. She accused her colleagues of overriding community wishes for their own ideological purposes.
“As a rewritten document, it has fundamentally failed to incorporate some of the engagement’s key findings,” she said at the meeting. Tolhurst said the results she had seen showed more than half of respondents did not want the vision changed, and a third said tackling climate change was their key priority.
“I could not, in reviewing all 387 survey responses, find a single one that called for the removal of reference to climate change.”
The furore at Queenscliffe follows several other councils having either rolled back climate commitments or watered down “climate emergency” language.
In April, Mornington Peninsula Shire rescinded its climate change declaration and the accompanying climate emergency plan in a narrow 6-5 vote.
Deputy mayor Paul Pingiaro, who backed the move, said it was not about denying climate change.
“It’s about facing a fiscal reality and ensuring our climate response delivers actual value, not just rhetoric,” he said at the time.
The same month, Colac Otway Shire councillors voted to amend their climate action plan, removing the listed causes of carbon emissions, including agriculture.
Colac Otway Shire councillor Charlie Buchanan, who moved the motion, said it wasn’t fair to single out farmers.
“Everyone recognises there’s some issues there. Personally, I think it’s an open book [as to] what’s causing climate change,” he said.
Scientists report that 2024 was the warmest year since records began in 1850, recording a global average 1.35 °C above pre-industrial average temperatures.
Colac Otway councillors also voted to reallocate funds previously set aside to purchase carbon credits to other programs, including farmers and “other relevant groups” in initiatives such as tree planting.
“Half of our shire is covered in forest and we were buying carbon credits overseas,” Buchanan said. “It’s just not right.”
In June, Warrnambool City Council rejected the advice of an independent, state government-commissioned flood study, with all but one councillor declaring they did not trust the data.
In Melbourne’s south-east, the Labor-dominated Dandenong Council narrowly voted to withdraw from a regional program for councils tackling climate change, suggesting the $128,249 saved this year – and more than $400,000 over three years - would be better spent on its own projects including transitioning from gas to renewable energy, installing solar panels and planting more trees.
The push for fiscal restraint has also led to a re-evaluation of climate policies at historically progressive inner-city councils.
Last month, Merri-bek Council in Melbourne’s inner north voted to scrap its long-standing carbon offset program, redirecting funding into direct action instead. While tangible commitments at Yarra City Council remain unchanged, the majority bloc of independent councillors voted down a request to explicitly refer to the climate crisis in its four-year plan, with Mayor Stephen Jolly describing the move as “everything wrong with local government”.
During recent budget processes, petitions were launched in both Bayside Council and Darebin Council by local climate groups concerned at a perceived watering-down of the importance of climate mitigation in the respective council budgets.
According to Dr Mark Chou, a local government expert from the Australian National University, the current trend represents a “step back” from a symbolic global movement to declare climate emergencies that began around 2016.
Chou, who was part of a research team who analysed fringe candidates in the most recent NSW and Victorian local council elections, said this “back to basics” narrative was ideological, not a return to a neutral position. He sees it as a “reactionary form of politics”.
It is “a return to councils being primarily there to serve property and property owners”, he said.
“It [often] means during tough times we look after those that matter most, those who own properties, and the issues that are important to them. We don’t have capacity to wade into all these excessive social, cultural or environmental issues.”
He noted the timing of the local council elections in Victoria playing out at the same time as the most recent US election, and said some of the “back to basics” rhetoric was obviously imported from overseas.
US-style culture wars have been playing out in councils post-COVID, including ambushes by conspiracy theorists at council meetings and ugly backlashes against drag queens performing for children at local libraries.
Chou said in some cases “back to basics” focuses on “roads, rates and rubbish” were being used as a “Trojan horse” for more extreme views.
But the trend isn’t universal; the City of Boroondara, which now has a progressive majority of ‘teal’ independents, recently quadrupled its budget for climate initiatives such as EV chargers and grants for electrification to $3.9 million in 2025-26, with Mayor Sophie Torney stating it was “what our community wants, and we’re proud to be a leader in this space”.
Jono La Nauze, CEO of Environment Victoria, warned that removing the focus on climate change’s impact on council services could leave councils and ratepayers worse off.
“The cost of maintaining council assets like roads, drainage and parks and gardens are already being pushed up by more frequent extreme weather events. Yet the cost savings of climate action are there for the picking,” he said.
“For example, Maribyrnong City Council estimate they will save $400,000 a year by switching their aquatic centre from polluting gas heating to an efficient electric heat pump system.”
Peter Cook from the Queenscliffe Climate Action Network is hoping next week doesn’t see his council move to scrap the Climate Emergency Response Plan his group spent years working on.
“It’s hard not to be concerned.”
Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.