Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I thought I did. The Prime Minister is telling Joe Biden we've got all these wonderful things. He doesn't tell him that we tried to repeal them. What he doesn't say is that the only thing this government, in all the time since it's been elected, has that wasn't a Greens or Labor idea is its Emissions Reduction Fund, which has saved barely 200 million tonnes of abatement over its lifetime. The CEFC alone, last year, brought in 250 million tonnes. And the government's Emissions Reduction Fund involves the public paying the polluters whereas things like the CEFC make money by growing new technology and new businesses.

Why on earth would you want to tinker with that and take money away from renewables and make it available to the gas and coal and dirty fuel corporations? There can only be two answers. One is that you don't seriously believe in climate change—and we heard from the Deputy Prime Minister that he doesn't care what happens in 30 years time. He doesn't care if we go over that cliff and our kids are left to pick up the mess. So we understand why the government is moving this bill. It is because they don't care what's going to happen in 30 years time. The only other reason you'd do it is that your big corporate donors have asked you to. Those big corporate donors, that pay zero dollars in tax, aren't being asked by this government to pay their fair share. Instead, they're being given more handouts. It's time to say enough of the handouts for the big corporations. The big corporations and the billionaires need to pay their fair share of tax. They need to pay a bit more so that everyone else can pay a bit less. That's going to start by amending this bill.

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