Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Environment and Heritage) Share this | Hansard source

In relation to the Australian National Registry of Emissions Units Bill 2011, I also wish to place on the record our support for the general concept and our support in particular for the notion of capturing carbon in soil, in vegetation, in trees and on non-prime agricultural land. This has been our idea. I see the Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities across the table who ridiculed the idea over the years at this very dispatch box. He denounced and derided the coalition's policy and then, not surprisingly, adopted it. We endorse the concept and we endorse the mechanism, but we do not believe that, as I have said elsewhere, it is fully ready. There is a reason: we have experience in relation to the Home Insulation Program, the Green Loans program and the warnings we gave in relation to the cash-for-clunkers program, which the government also realised was unsustainable, unjustifiable and unbelievable.

Having said that, I do want to put this statement, which I think is an important statement, on the record: we will not be abolishing the bill. It is important to give this message to potential actors and investors in the space. We will, if elected, simply seek to improve the bill, remedy the defects which we have identified and, in particular, seek a better and more workable agreement in relation to the concept of permanence. The 100-year rule will ultimately be self-defeating and destructive, and we want to make sure that there are adequate protections for prime agricultural land. Improvements have been made in the Senate, but we will maintain our right to further improve it and ensure that the legislation is fully functional.

So our position remains: support for the concept, acceptance of the amendments, but a belief and a judgment that the legislation is not ready yet. For that reason, we have not provided support for final passage of the bill. We acknowledge that it is a mechanism that we proposed, outlined and defended in the face of then opposition from the government of the day. We will not abolish or withdraw this legislation; we will seek to improve it if elected.

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