Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I did, Mr Deputy Speaker; I withdraw. He behaves like a political faith-healer pretending that he can solve any problem. If he stands up in the House and says he can solve it, he can solve it. Electricity prices would be going down if he were in power, according to the Leader of the Opposition. He can do something fundamental, he says, to reduce prices across the board. This is nonsense. This is fairyland stuff. This stuff is la-la land politics and la-la land economics.

I can see the embarrassment on the faces of many opposite who know the emptiness of what the Leader of the Opposition is talking about. Like all conmen, he will be found out in time. He wants to slide into the prime ministership of this country by demonstrating that he has absolutely no economic expertise whatsoever. Difficult problems such as climate change, such as dealing with a global recession and such as responding to floods require difficult decisions. What this Leader of the Opposition has proved during the global recession, during the floods in Queensland and during this debate is that he cannot be trusted in times of crisis and he most certainly cannot be trusted in times of challenge. He simply does not have the expertise, he does not have the economic knowledge and he does not have the temperament to deal with these challenges like a national leader does need to deal with these challenges.

The fact is the business community of this country absolutely understands the need for a price on carbon, for business certainty. It goes to the very core of our future prosperity. In the past in this country Labor governments have had the guts to take tough decisions, to take decisions which are hard politically. But we have done it in the long-term interests of economic reform and of wealth creation. Floating the dollar, bringing down the tariff wall, enterprise bargaining and competition policy are all great reforms of previous Labor governments. But the big reform that is required in the 21st century to cope with the biggest market failure in the history of the globe is to put a price on carbon, because the failure to price carbon has meant that it has been omitted in ways in which it should not be and it is gradually poisoning our planet. We have a responsibility to deal with it, not just an environmental responsibility but an economic responsibility. It is a great economic challenge.

Economists around the world from both left and right, governments from both left and right and think tanks from both left and right all understand the importance of putting a price on carbon, but not the Leader of the Opposition. I know at least half of those opposite understand the importance of a price on carbon. After all, they voted for it in the last leadership contest within the Liberal Party. They voted for a price on carbon, which is why the member for Wentworth was so explicit in his interview on BBC television when he reminded the interviewer that he only lost by one vote. What he was simply saying is a carbon emissions trading scheme in this country was not implemented because of one vote in the House of Representatives in the Liberal and Nationals party room. That is what it came down to. The threat that then flows from that to this country’s prosperity into the future is indeed substantial.

Of course, there is a furious debate about this, and so there should be. It is a very important economic decision. It is one that we have argued for long and hard for a long period of time. Following the last election, we thought it was our responsibility to get the price of carbon in place, working with the composition of this parliament, and that is what we have done. We do not apologise for that. We understand there will be political pain associated with it. But that is the right thing to do by the country.

I do not know what the Leader of the Opposition thinks of companies like Shell, Origin Energy, Santos or BHP Billiton, but they are very, very big investors in this country. They are responsible for a large number of jobs in our economy and they are making more and more investments. But the Leader of the Opposition comes in here and talks of anyone who is supporting a carbon price as if they are somehow irresponsible. The irresponsible person in this House is the Leader of the Opposition, who is wrecking business certainty in this country not just by opposing a carbon price but by now saying to the people of Australia and to the international investment community he will repeal it if it is passed. That is a very substantial threat to investment in our community, and it is absolutely reckless for the Leader of the Opposition to make that statement and for the Liberal Party to talk about it in those terms. What we do know is that he will be giving to subsequent generations, if we do not act, an even bigger burden of paying the price for climate change. He is transferring the cost to subsequent generations, to our children and to our grandchildren.

That is why we need to be brave now, why we need to be firm now: to put in place the arrangements that will assist in getting this in place, so they will benefit. The cost of inaction is far greater, far greater, than the cost of action. This is not something that the Leader of the Opposition understands but it is something that the investment community understand. Our largest companies understand. They certainly understand that we have to become much more carbon efficient. What this requires in particular is investment in cleaner energy and of course renewable energy, particularly when it comes to our power sector. What appalled me in the comments from the Leader of the Opposition today was his ignorance of the fact that the failure to invest in that sector is what is driving electricity prices upward and that, if we do not deal with certainty of investment in that sector, they will go higher and higher, and—

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