Democrat Senator Andrew Bartlett blogs today about the screening of Al Gore’s very own apocalypto at Parliament House last night. He’s generous to Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment Greg Hunt: “The federal government is open to a lot of criticism (quite rightly in my view) for their record on climate change, so Greg Hunt should be congratulated for promoting the film.” But it’s this line that stands out: “We are talking about a potentially dramatically different future that our children – and indeed many adults alive today – will face.”

Peter Costello made much of his intergenerational report on the challenges faced by an ageing population. Why isn’t he – let alone any of the squad of bright young wannabes of the Government – talking more about this aspect of our future, on any side of the debate?

There’s a chance that they might have to deal with a very hard triple whammy. The Carbonsink blog packages it all up very cutely:

1. The Demographic Crunch

By 2020 the boomers will be no longer be able to delay retirement. Medical costs will skyrocket. The pool of taxpayers will shrink. No-one is denying this will happen, it’s the least controversial of these issues.

2. The Oil Crunch

Even the oil companies admit oil production will peak around 2020. Once oil production plateaus it will put a cap on global economic growth that we cannot escape… Could the Peak Oilers be wrong? Well yes, they’ve been wrong before and they will be wrong again… The optimists say there’s a lot of oil in tar sands in Canada and Venezuela but these reserves are only economically viable when crude prices are very high… For every three barrels of oil you produce you have to burn two…

3. The Climate Crunch

If the scientists are right (and they’re not just making this stuff up to protect their funding) climate change should be hitting us big time by 2020. A few things that might shock the punters out of their complacency; a major Australian city or town runs out of water… the snow stops falling at Perisher and Thredbo. Funnily enough, I reckon the last one would have the biggest impact. James Packer might notice…

There should be plenty of meat there for bright young government MPs to get their teeth into – yet they clearly have no appetite for this debate.