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

I refer the parliament to this report of the former Howard government on emissions trading—the emissions trading scheme the former Howard government wanted to introduce and which, if it had introduced it as heralded by this report, would have started on 1 July this year. That emissions trading scheme of the Howard government would have had a carbon price on petrol. That is, the Leader of the Opposition was a cabinet minister in a government that would have put a carbon price on petrol from 1 July this year. That is the truth from this report.

Instead, the Leader of the Opposition has been out trying to scare Australian families. It is time for him to do the decent thing, to go back to Queanbeyan and to say to the people at the fresh food market that he was wrong when he said to them that petrol would go up, to go back to Moorebank and say to the community there that he was wrong when he said that petrol would go up. He should stand at the dispatch box and say in this parliament that he was wrong when he said petrol would go up. That would be the decent thing to do. We await to see whether or not the Leader of the Opposition is a decent man who will do it. (Time expired)

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