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

What the government's facts and figures show is, as a result of putting a price on carbon, we will cut carbon pollution by 160 million tonnes in 2020. The government will achieve what has been a bipartisan target about emissions reduction.

The Leader of the Opposition, of course, has continued day after day to misrepresent all aspects of carbon pricing: to misrepresent what it will achieve; to misrepresent who pays the price—it is of course large businesses that generate carbon pollution that will pay the price; to misrepresent the impacts on Australian households. Today he has even been out trying to scare cats and dogs about the impact of carbon pricing—out at the RSPCA telling poor old Fido and Fluffy a fairytale about how a cobra and a python is coming to get them! I can assure the Leader of the Opposition that on 1 July cats will still purr, dogs will still bark, and the Australian economy will continue to get stronger. We will continue to see jobs grow and we will see Australian families with the benefit of tax cuts, family payment increases and pension increases, and the Leader of the Opposition's fear campaign will collide with the facts, with the truth.

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