Greg Combet (Charlton, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting the Minister for Climate Change) Share this | Hansard source

I have seen the member for Groom walking around the floor with the black book he mentioned on Four Corners. I am very happy to provide the names of the senators. One thing I can say is that amongst them was Senator Bernardi, known now as Senator Minchin’s foot soldier, who continued his rant against the science saying:

One could describe it as the Sara lee cheesecake effect: layer upon layer upon layer of alarmism and deceit giving rise to the new religion of climate change.

So we have communist conspiracies, we have neo-Nazi science and we have religions of climate change based on deceit—quite bizarre and absurd commentary continues to come. Senator Abetz is still maintaining that weeds—lantana, paterson’s curse, you roll it up—are a greater problem than climate change. That is Senator Abetz. Senator Cash reconfirmed that she does not support action. She put a concise argument under any circumstances. She said:

Under no circumstances should the CPRS be supported—under no circumstances.

It is little wonder that there is profound, obvious division in the coalition. Senator Cash is unmoved by the fact that average rainfall decline of 10 to 20 per cent since the 1960s has caused a 50 per cent decline in dam inflows in south-western Australia. One would expect that she might have some concern about that. Another confirmed sceptic from WA, the member for Tangney—a denier, it is suggested to me—told the AAP today that more than a third of the Liberal Party would probably cross the floor to vote no, even if the government agrees to the coalition’s amendments. With just five days left to vote on the CPRS, all of those opposite should be acting to limit the impact of climate change on Australia, cut out the nonsense, stop the delays and vote for the CPRS.

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