The country’s outgoing climate watchdog has been too sensitive to government views, an independent review has found.
It says the Climate Change Advisory Council has been reactive to government policy rather than proactive in shaping it, has too many heads of state agencies as members and has not communicated well with the public as its reports were “highly complex, somewhat static, and dry”.
It also says the council has been too focused on the economic implications of climate action and that it sought incremental changes in society and the economy when transformational change was urgently required.
It does, however, praise the council, the first ever in this country, for establishing itself as “an authoritative voice in the national climate debate”.