About High & Dry: WelcomeExtractTrailerInterviewAbout GuyContact GuyCorrections etc.Buy the Book
Pre-Election Essentials:Guy’s CommentsStats of the DayDid you knowKey GraphsMediaSpeechesPM’s XI

WHAT'S NEW

Election Campaign Events

Guy is speaking across the country during the 2007 election campaign. As part of this, he has teamed up with Greenpeace to do a series of presentations on Australia’s response to climate change. For details on this collaboration see here.

To view Guy’s presentation click here.

Latest Blog:

November 24 - In the piece I co-wrote with Terry Tamminen in this week’s Bulletin Magazine, we said there was no reason why State Liberal leaders in Australia couldn’t emulate the increasing number of US Republican leaders following Arnold Schwarzenegger’s lead in California. But, who could have imagined that the most impressive greenhouse policy contribution to the 2007 federal election would come in the final week from a state Liberal MP—Peter Debnam. His speech this week was the first time in 11 years that a serving senior Liberal Party MP has publicly repudiated by far the darkest aspect of John Howard’s legacy as Prime Minister: Australia’s response to climate change. (read more)

Latest Media

How green is your ally, Op-ed piece by Guy Pearse & Terry Tamminen, Bulletin Magazine, 21/11/07

(more media)

Guy's Election Flyer

Click here to view the flyer

stat of the day

142 nations ratify ‘dead’ Protocol

In March 2001, George W Bush declared ‘Kyoto is Dead’ – a line that has been echoed consistently by the Howard government. Since that time, 142 nations have ratified the Kyoto Protocol: 12 more in 2001; 55 in 2002; 19 in 2003; 13 in 2004; 24 in 2005; 12 in 2006; and 7 in 2007 (8 if Kevin Rudd is elected). The first commitment period of the ‘dead Kyoto protocol’ begins in 2008 and extends to 2012.

Read previous 'Stats of the Day'

Today’s Did you know?

In 11 ½ years, not one senior serving federal Liberal or National Party MP has publicly challenged John Howard’s response to climate change. Hopefully that changes after November 24, 2007

Read previous 'Did You Know?'

Welcome

Guy PearseWelcome to highanddry.com.au. I really appreciate your interest. The website provides a taste of the content covered in the book, including an extract. The site also seeks to provide people with some of the essential information they need to understand John Howard’s response to climate change in time for the 2007 federal election.

 

About High & Dry

Australia’s climate is changing. Water shortage is chronic and irreversible, temperatures are rising, extreme weather events are more frequent, species are dying on land and at sea.

The world's scientists agree that to avoid the worst environmental damage we must cut at least 60 per cent of global emissions by 2050. Instead, Australia is on track to Increase emissions by 70 per cent over this period. Why Is the Howard government acting so conspicuously against the world's Interests, and against Australia's own future?

In this damning account, Liberal Party member, lobbyist and former Howard-government advisor Guy Pearse takes us behind the rhetoric he once helped write. He reveals that the government has no plans whatsoever to reduce Australia's emissions, and explains why this is bad for Australia's economy. He exposes a prime minister wilfully blind to Australia's real Interests - a man who has allowed climate change policy to be dictated by a small group of Australia's biggest polluters and the lobbyists they fund.

Just as Tim Flannery's The Weather Makers explained the science of climate change, High & Dry explains the politics. You cannot understand the future of Australia without reading this book.

 

What people are saying about High & Dry

'If great tragedies tell of great people greatly flawed, then the story told by Guy Pearse in High and Dry is surely the defining tragedy of our times. The tragedy's roots, Pearse thinks, lie in the unbridled influence of perfidious advisers and a leader whose vision was just too limited, and who was perhaps a little too stubborn, to see the great menace threatening his country . . . The overwhelming sense I was left with after reading High and Dry was that of betrayal. Pearse is so clearly a proud Liberal, and a great patriot, who feels deeply the burden that has fallen on him to blow the whistle on a very sorry episode in Australian political history . . . High and Dry is an appeal to the Liberal constituency to "start letting the Party know how you feel". It's a tragedy so diligently and honestly told that Pearse, I think, cannot help but hit his mark.' (Tim Flannery – Australian of the Year 2007)

' . . . it is a book about ideas, many of which should have been on the political agenda for years. Ideas, sadly, are not the currency of today's political  discourse . . . Pearse has a habit of asking inconvenient questions, ones seldom mentioned by politicians or lazy commentators . . . (His ideas) are lively and provocative, a chink of light in the dark malaise of present Australian politics.' (John Button – The Monthly)

'Guy Pearse's insights into the politics of greenhouse are timely indeed. Pearse has made some enemies with this tell-all account of how the Howard government continues to be dragged kicking and screaming to the table on climate change – but then, as I found out some years ago, it's publish and be damned in the modern Liberal Party. The strength of this book is that it has been so well researched . . . (and) in case you think this is a book simply for political junkies and policy makers, there is an excellent section dealing with community and individual strategies that can be taken . . . High & Dry is a fine debut from a welcome new voice in the climate change debate.' (Greg Barns – Hobart Mercury)

 'The allegations raised by Pearse are not easily dismissed . . . Because of his pedigree and because of his access this is a book that could do considerable damage' (Chris Hammer – The Bulletin)

'Pearse is not so much dumping on the Liberal establishment as trying with all his charming might to save Liberal power-holders from the worst effects of their own bad policy choices . . . A vivid story . . . carefully researched and scholarly analysis . . . ' (John Uhr – The Canberra Times)

'What sets Dr Pearse apart from some other Australians just as convinced that the PM is the nation's stumbling block on climate change is that he comes from a position of authority . . . Dr Pearse adds far greater detail to his Four Corners allegations in the more than 400 pages of his first book High & Dry, which has been selling fast since it reached the bookstores . . . ' (Chris Johnson – The West Australian)

'(Pearse) means to have his message heard. With the political savvy honed over 15 years in the service of the Liberal Party, he has timed the release of his book in the run-up to the federal election.' (Deborah Bogle – Adelaide Advertiser)

'Guy Pearse – a Liberal who cares about climate change. He's obviously on the take from the environmental movement. What a complete f*cken fraud!' (Charles Firth – The Chaser's War on Everything)