No such thing as a wasted vote: how young Australians can still be heard on climate

In 2022, Australian Labor rode a wave of Black Saturday anger all the way to power.

Throughout that campaign, images of the global warming-fuelled bushfires – and the government’s failure to handle them – dominated the airwaves.  

Since then, young Australians have watched their planet fare worse, not better. We’ve seen the United States withdraw from the Paris Agreement. We’ve heard the horror stories of the Los Angeles wildfires. We listened anxiously for news of post-tropical cyclone Alfred.

After all that, what are we to make of our leaders’ intense focus on the cost of living over climate change in 2025? 

According to science communicator and ANU Young Alum of the year, Lee Constable, it’s not as simple as asking the government to focus on one thing or the other. 

“Renewable energy in Australia has been responsible for keeping the cost of our energy bills lower. So even though we’re struggling with energy bills, we’re in a better position because of the huge amount of our grid that is coming from solar and wind,” she says. 

And while there is so much still to do, Constable says it’s not all doom and gloom. She cites another uniquely Australian source of hope: the world-leading fairness of our elections. 

“One of the things that gives me a lot of hope on election day here in Australia is that we have a lot of choice when it comes to who we vote for, and we also have a fully preferential voting system,” she says.

“We can always put our ideal candidate first, even if they’re an independent or a smaller party,” Constable says.  

Because, as she puts it, “there’s no such thing as a wasted vote.”