Finance Minister Simon Birmingham has dismissed suggestions the Nationals are dictating climate change policy ahead of a crucial meeting of the governing coalition's junior partner.
The Nationals are meeting on Sunday to discuss Prime Minister Scott Morrison's plan to commit to net zero emissions by 2050, before he heads to Glasgow later this month for the United Nations climate change conference.
Energy and Emission Reductions Minister Angus Taylor is addressing the Nationals meeting, spelling out how the plan will protect jobs and regional communities.
It is not clear whether the Nationals will make a decision whether to endorse the plan at the meeting.
Asked in Sky News' Sunday Agenda program whether the Nationals are dictating climate change policy, Senator Birmingham said: "Certainly not".
"The government is deciding the government's climate change policy," he said.
"We bring together people right across the country to be able to effectively consider all of the implications and issues."
But he said there is no point pretending that some parts of the community are not concerned about the implications of these decisions.
"The important message to them and to those who represent them is to understand other nations are already making these commitments," Senator Birmingham said.
"Other nations are already making decisions that will have impacts on Australia and that's why we need to invest and position ourselves to make sure we can take advantage of opportunities and make the transition successfully to protect jobs, to protect regions."
Former veterans minister and now Nationals backbencher Darren Chester is ending his boycott of the party room to atttend the online meeting.
"The Nationals party room can't be looking back wistfully at the 1950s as the good old days, when our communities are looking forward with optimism and purpose to a better future in 2050," he told Nine newspapers on Sunday.
But Labor's Katy Gallagher says it is still not known what the government's ambition is.
"What we have seen is eight years, three prime ministers, 21 energy policies and now we have got the prime minister trying to wrangle a last-minute deal with the Nationals party about what they actually stand for," she told the ABC on Sunday.
"They need to agree to net zero, they need to legislate that target and they need to set medium targets. That is the minimum the government should be doing."
While supporting net zero emissions by 2050, Labor has yet to fully lay out its plans to get there and has yet to announce its 2030 or interim target.
Senator Gallagher didn't rule out a price on carbon.
"We will outline our policies. We are looking at everything. We are looking at all of the information that is coming from all of the reviews. We are watching Glasgow and we will announce our policies in the lead-up to the election," she said.
"That is the responsible thing to do."
