Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Again the member for O’Connor scoffs. I thought the Liberal Party were engaged in serious negotiations with us. Without clear national positions, including strong national commitments, there can be no deal, which is why we must work on our national commitments as well, which brings us to the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. In an exercise of good faith on the part of the government, what we have indicated to the opposition in their good faith negotiations with us is that we are prepared to act on their concerns relating to agriculture. In the positions which have been put forward by the coalition to us up until now, the advice that we have obtained from the coalition is that agriculture was, frankly, a red line issue for them. Therefore, because we are determined to try and bring about a deal on the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme and because we recognise some of the internal political realities within the coalition, we have made this as a good faith gesture on our part in our determined efforts to bring about an outcome.

The final two weeks of sittings in the Senate will be devoted to the legislation. The legislation will be voted on in the House of Representatives and introduced to the Senate at the beginning of this week. There will be time for every single senator to speak on this bill—every single senator—if they so choose: two weeks. Further, the government will be prepared to extend parliamentary sittings as I know so many senators will want to speak on this bill. But the key thing is this: after so long of not acting on an emissions trading scheme within this country, the time has come to act, as those opposite have consistently argued themselves in recent years.

I say to all those opposite: continue your good faith negotiations with the government. I urge your negotiator the member for Groom, my good friend from Queensland, not to lose heart but to remain engaged in these negotiations, because we have some global interests at stake which will ultimately so much hang, as far as Australia is concerned, on our national actions as well. There is also the minor matter of business certainty. We will continue these good faith negotiations with the coalition. In the national interest and for business certainty we want this outcome. For the international interest and to underpin a global framework agreement at Copenhagen we need this outcome. The clock is ticking for the planet, it is ticking for Australia and it is ticking for this parliament.

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