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

This government, on the question of climate change, has confronted two realities. Firstly, those opposite decided to U-turn completely in supporting the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. They voted it down in the Senate and the Greens voted it down in the Senate. The second thing which occurred was that, at the Copenhagen conference, global action on climate change was not as substantial as the rest of the international community had hoped. As a consequence, if the government is re-elected, we will reintroduce the ETS legislation at the end of the current Kyoto commitment period. That is why we would do so, on the basis that global action on climate change is clear.

On that note, I would draw the attention of the opposition and the parliament at large to reports today contained in the American media about the impending content of the American Power Act. The American Power Act also deals with the same question of climate change. It also deals with the question of putting a cap on carbon pollution, making polluters pay and compensating households. I would draw their attention also to the fact that, when it comes to the passage of this bill, the reports contained in the US media today indicate that the measures would become operational from 2013. That is the commencement of the new period subsequent to the Kyoto commitment period. So I draw to the attention of those opposite that the rest of the world is acting on climate change.

The outcome from Copenhagen was not as substantial as those of us who participated in that conference wanted. The government’s ETS legislation has been voted down by those opposite and by the Greens in the Senate. The government remains committed to its greenhouse gas reduction targets. The government remains committed to the principle of an emissions trading scheme as the best way of bringing about greenhouse gas reductions and the cheapest way of doing so.

But my challenge to those opposite, if they have any skerrick of commitment on the question of climate change, is to answer this: how is it that, in the 21st century, you could support this Leader of the Opposition, who says that the world was hotter in Jesus’ time? How could you actually hold to a belief, in defiance of total science around the world, that somehow in the last 2000 years the world has become cooler, not warmer? How could you stand behind a leader who says that the industrial revolution, in effect, did not happen? The core divide between us is that this Leader of the Opposition does not believe in climate change. He has said it is ‘absolute crap’. He has rejected the science and he now tells us that it was hotter in the time of Jesus of Nazareth than it is today. I would say to the Leader of the Opposition: that view is positively weird.

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