Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

After 11 years of inaction and denial on climate change, the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Bill 2007 represents a hastily cobbled together attempt by the government to look as though it is doing something, just before the election is called. The bill establishes a single national framework for reporting greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption and production by corporations by 1 July 2008. By the 2010-11 financial year the reporting framework will apply to approximately 700 companies that emit more than 500,000 tonnes.

This bill has been developed, however, without appropriate consultation with state governments, industry bodies or environment groups. Given that the National Emissions Trading Taskforce, established by state governments, put out a discussion paper last year, it is extraordinary that the federal government has not consulted with them properly. Given the importance the economic transformation to a carbon constrained economy will have for industry, it is extraordinary that there has not been proper consultation with them. And, given the importance of climate change as the moral challenge for our generation, it is extraordinary that there has not been proper consultation with environment groups. But of course this is a government that has been in denial over climate change for 11 years.

In 2003 the Treasurer put forward a submission to cabinet for an emissions trading scheme. It was supported by his department, it was supported by the Department of the Environment and Heritage, it was supported by the Department of Industry, Tourism and Resources and it was supported by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. But it was not supported by the Prime Minister, a Prime Minister stuck in the past and not capable of making the leap forward into the policies that are required of a modern government in the 21st century, a Prime Minister who does not have the support of the majority of his own cabinet colleagues. Even they have realised that he is so out of touch with what is needed for leadership in this nation in 2007 and beyond that they informed the Prime Minister collectively last week that they had come to the view that it was time he retired.

We also know that the basis of the Treasurer’s submission to cabinet in 2003 was the number of reports that were produced by the emissions trading group in the Australian Greenhouse Office. The group did all the research and produced the reports but the government’s response was not to implement the policy but to abolish that group. When Labor raised—as we have continued to do day after day, month after month and year after year—the need for a price on carbon and the need for market based mechanisms to drive the transformation to a carbon constrained economy by having a national emissions trading scheme, the Prime Minister’s response and rhetoric up until last year was that this was a Labor tax. I remember debating the current minister’s predecessor, Senator—

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