Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I am a bit surprised that the member for Flinders would come to the dispatch box. He has caused me to ponder whether, if you walk away from your honours thesis, you get your honours degree stripped off you? I think someone needs to answer that question for us, because his honours thesis makes very good reading. I happen to have extracts of it here. He said:

… the market is the preferable regime as it better ensures that the polluter bears full responsibility for the cost of his or her conduct.

Good words. He wrote:

Businesses’ greatest concern, according to the Liberal Party, is the need to have a certainty which would enable them to plan for the long term.

I could not have written it better myself. I am glad he got first-class honours. I am a bit ashamed he is walking away from it now. In answer to the Leader of the Opposition’s question, the Leader of the Opposition well knows that the Labor Party went to the 2007 election saying we would price carbon with an emissions trading scheme.

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