Kerry Rea (Bonner, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this afternoon also to talk to this matter of public importance. I stress that that is the segment of today’s proceedings that we are speaking under—matters of public importance. When we hear from the opposition that what they want us to do around this very, very important public debate is simply talk about their report and look at issues around decoupling the renewable energy legislation from the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, you can tell that they do not take this issue as a serious matter of public importance. They take it more as a diversionary tactic over their leadership troubles. We know that climate change is real. We know that the science is there, that the evidence is there and that this is, as I said, a fundamental matter of public importance. In fact, it is so important that it requires us to completely rethink the way that we as a community, as a nation, indeed as a global society, do business.

We have had at least 10 years of debate about how we as a planet can address this and about how we as human beings can start to reverse in some way the impact that we have had on our atmosphere and on pollution. We have had 18 months of the government putting out green papers and white papers and engaging, as the member for Corio said, in probably one of the most detailed public debates we have ever seen in this country. But what do we get from the opposition? Two days before this vital legislation is being voted on, we get a consultant’s report that is not even endorsed by them as a party policy. It has been cobbled together in six weeks—as I said, not to seriously address the issue of reducing emissions and pollution but in fact to divert the public’s attention away from their leader’s appalling approval ratings and continuous drop in the polls.

It is a report which has been cobbled together and which has no real substance at all. It has nine vague principles. There is this wonderful scheme that is going to completely exempt those industries which contribute most to carbon emissions in this country. It is not going to really deal with the energy sector at all. They want us to decouple and support renewable energy. At the same time, it is going to deliver an even bigger reduction in emissions than what is proposed in the government’s legislation! This is not a magic pudding; it is a half-baked magic pudding. It is a furphy that has been put up by them, and that shows no real intent to debate or address these very fundamental issues.

The opposition claim that our legislation is an attack on farmers. It is not. In fact, if you speak to people in regional and rural Australia, they will tell you that they are some of the biggest victims of climate change and that they are desperate for the government and the community to address this very critical issue. If you actually talk to people about what the challenges are on this particular issue—

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