Net zero Australia LIVE updates: Ley says meeting 2050 target ‘would be welcome’ but energy affordability is policy goal after Liberals agree to dump 2050 target

Opposition Leader Sussan Ley has finished her press conference by saying that if she upsets international partners by pursuing lower household energy prices over lower emissions she can “deal with that”.

“Paris is about a global agreement to bring down temperatures and reduce emissions. That’s exactly what we propose to do. And we will look Australians in the eye and say, ‘This is a plan to bring down emissions and to provide affordable energy for you’,” Ley said.

Sussan Ley at her Friday press conference.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“If there are reasons why people in Paris or in some United Nations organisation don’t like it, I can deal with that,” she said.

Ley also invoked her six grandchildren under six years of age, saying she wants to leave them a better country to live in, on both environmental and economic terms.

“I look at the world that they’re set to inherit if the policies of this Labor government continue, and if we do want to talk about climate change, the climate change policies of Labor are failing,” she said.

“So I can’t in all honesty say to anyone that you will inherit a better environmentally responsible country under this government’s climate change policies and we all know that, because emissions came down under us, they’re going up if not flat lining under Labor,” she said.

“The other thing that I want to be able to say to my grandchildren is that you should inherit a better standard of living than my generation and your mum and dad’s generation. Right now, they are set to inherit the worst standard of living since the Second World War, and I don’t think that’s fair,” Ley said.