Environment Minister Peter Garrett has come under fire for his roofing foil insulation scheme, which has had a quick A$50m injected into it for home safety inspections to occur after a series of safety issues, including the death of four insulation installers.

The political and media sharks are circling:

The Australian

The Oz editorial: The Rudd government’s green image takes a hit

That’s embarrassing, but the real damage to Mr Garrett and the government is the way the issue will play out with average Australians. It’s the kind of snafu voters never forget, along the lines of “if these blokes can’t even insulate a roof, how can they run the country?” That the program has imploded over safety fears compounds the image problem.

The Age

Katharine Murphy and Tom Arup: Fading star

Garrett’s political challenge would be difficult enough on its own, but it comes at a time when the politics of climate change has shifted on terms negative for federal Labor. The imbroglios amplify the sensation that the government has lost its political mojo on climate change.

Daily Telegraph

Mark Mann, Mark Mann blog, Garrett giving green a bad name

Peter Garrett’s Department of Environment is giving green a bad name. Three major Federal Government green programs being run by the Department of Environment have now descended into farce or tragedy.

The Courier-Mail

Dennis Atkins: It’s time to wind back the spin on insulation scheme

It was Garrett, however, who had difficulty seeing the outcome as his explanation was lost in a torrent of verbal sludge about meetings, consultative groups, reassessments, forms, guidelines and standards.

Elsewhere

Crikey’s Bernard Keane, The Stump, The pursuit of Peter peters out… but more berating of Barnaby to come:

There was more than a trace of blood in the water around Garrett as he called a press conference right before Question Time today. Several journalists wondered whether he was going to resign, although given the lack of pressure from the Opposition, it didn’t quite scan that Garrett was either going to offer his head or was going to be pushed by Rudd

…

The grilling consisted of three questions on the administration of his portfolio, which Garrett handled nervously but relatively well, taking his time on his third answer to explain in detail the process for assessing assessors under the Green Loans program. The depth of detail into which Garrett went seemed to suck the life from the Opposition, because after that they turned their fire on, of all people, Lindsay Tanner.

…

It was not the sign of an Opposition in hot pursuit of a wounded Minister. There was none of the bite or tension that usually gives away that even Government MPs know they’re in trouble.

The Opposition never came back to Garrett, who must have been unable to believe his luck. …Garrett now only has one more Question Time to survive before Parliament rises.

Mark Bahnisch, Larvatus Prodeo blog: Should Peter Garrett resign?

Yet none of this goes to the question of whether Garrett *should* resign.

Central, here, I think is the fact that his department was alerted to the possible adverse consequences on several occasions before the scheme went ahead, by both the NECA and state bureaucrats.

It’s also taking the government’s environmental focus away from climate change.

ABC

Jonathan Holmes: Journalists weather the changing climate

The science needed selling. But where were the salespeople? Who is there, arguing passionately and compellingly that climate change is real, and urgent? … Peter Garrett has been sidelined.