WITH his new status as winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, Al Gore's passionate call for the Prime Minister, John Howard, to ratify the Kyoto Protocol will now resonate throughout the election campaign.

Just weeks ago, on his last visit to Sydney, the former US vice-president and climate change crusader urged Mr Howard to break with Washington and ratify the treaty.

"My country and yours are the Bonnie and Clyde of the global environment," Mr Gore told a large gathering of business and Labor Party high flyers at Darling Harbour. If Australia changed course, he predicted, it would be "impossible" for the US President, George Bush, to resist the pressure to do so, too.

On an earlier visit to Australia to launch his Oscar-winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, Mr Gore was memorably cold-shouldered by Mr Howard and the Industry Minister, Ian Macfarlane, who called the film, "one man's interpretation of fact".

Back in 2006, Mr Macfarlane dismissed Mr Gore's warnings on climate change, saying: "Al Gore's here to sell tickets to a movie and no one can begrudge him that."

He added: "It's just entertainment, and really that's all it is."

But Mr Gore's documentary took the message about the urgency of climate change around the world. The film has become the third highest grossing documentary of all time, taking more than $US50 million ($55 million) and selling more than 1.5 million DVDs.

This week, its distribution to British schools hit a hurdle when a High Court judge there found it contained nine scientific errors. While Justice Michael Burton found the film was "broadly accurate" and did not order the film withdrawn from schools, he did say it should only be shown with guidance notes to counter its "one-sided" viewpoint.

Mr Gore's spokeswoman said the judge had taken issue with only a small number of issues out of the many thousands in the film.

The Nobel Peace Prize will put the 59-year-old Mr Gore under more pressure to succumb to what has been called "the last temptation of Al Gore" - a second run for the White House.

But Mr Gore, who calls himself "a recovering politician", swore off party politics after he won the popular vote in the 2000 election but lost the White House to George Bush. That crushing blow was delivered by the US Supreme Court, when it famously shut down the Florida recount.

A bitterly disappointed Mr Gore turned his back on his old career and dedicated his efforts to raising the alarm over global warming. His critics accused him of being alarmist but Mr Gore does not apologise for his passion.

As he told his Sydney audience recently: "This is like a freight train coming at our kids".

Mr Gore's last visit here was politically charged, coming so close to the election.

The Labor leader, Kevin Rudd, who Mr Gore met during his visit, has promised to ratify Kyoto and break with US policy on the global climate change negotiations set down for December in Bali.

Mr Gore, acutely aware of the political clock, told his Australian audiences this was "a moment when Australia can tip the balance". And, he added, "I hope that you will".

While Mr Gore did not publicly endorse Mr Rudd, he was happily photographed with the Opposition Leader and a raft of Labor luminaries, including Maxine McKew, who is standing against the Prime Minister in Bennelong.

Addressing Ms McKew during the Sydney lunch, Mr Gore, with southern charm, said he "appreciated the courtesy" of their brief meeting.

While Mr Gore is now recognised around the world as the most vocal public figure on climate change, he likes to remind reporters he started talking about the issue decades ago. As he told Time magazine recently: "I feel like the country singer who spends 30 years on the road to become an overnight sensation".