Susan Templeman (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

They are going to be hours of speeches from those opposite on Hansard saying why it won't work, why we shouldn't do anything, why it's not being done well enough. In fact, the biggest danger we face as a country is the do-nothing attitude that those opposite have had for nearly a decade. This is not a time to be saying why it won't work, why it can't work or why it shouldn't work. It's a time to be saying, 'Let's make it work.' Let's come together and have a piece of legislation that can have a starting point here, can continue as we evolve as a country and, as our energy needs change, can evolve with us. I'm very proud to say that the Albanese government is not prepared to do nothing, not prepared to just sit back and shrug its shoulders and find all the excuses in the world for inaction. We want to see things change.

I think we need to go back to why this bill, the Safeguard Mechanism (Crediting) Amendment Bill 2022, is necessary. It's necessary because we've made a commitment to reduce national emissions to 43 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 and to net zero by 2050. These things are realistic and achievable but it takes that deliberate effort and sustained effort to achieve them, and every sector has to play its part. This bill is about addressing one part of the jigsaw puzzle that goes into reducing our emissions, and, just as importantly, increasing our reliance on renewables.

The safeguard mechanism is providing for us a well-established framework—it's already legislated—that places emissions limits on large industrial facilities. We've been very clear that this policy is designed to get emissions down from every one of the big industries, new providers that might come in, the fossil fuels industry. It's not just about coal and gas; it's about things like aluminium. It's about the steelmakers. It's about fertilisers, and making sure they're playing a role in reducing emissions. It's about our airlines. It's not just about the old businesses; it's about the new ones too. It's about the facilities that have been there for a really long time, and it's about the ones that might come online. It isn't just a mechanism for one thing in particular.

Let's be really clear: if this bill doesn't pass, nothing changes. There'd be no constraints at all on emissions for anyone. I am staggered to think anyone in this parliament, having been through the election we had and seen the results delivered to this place, can be under any doubt that the vast majority of Australians want to see action on climate change. If this doesn't pass, nothing changes, and that would be a tragedy.

As to the effect of this, I want to address some of the questions that have come to me. I thank all the people who've really looked into this and tried to get their head around it. They've got together and come and met with me to talk about the things that they'd like to see it go further on. I completely understand their desire to do that, and I have listened to all of those. I've had emails, phone calls and face-to-face meetings, both here and back in my electorate, with people of the Blue Mountains and Hawkesbury. I really welcome those inputs and the desire to say, 'We can see that this is happening; we would like it to go just that bit further.'

I think it's important to remember that what we are talking about is a piece of legislation that, as it stands, is the equivalent of taking 205 million tonnes of carbon out of the air by 2030. That's the equivalent of two-thirds of the cars on Australian roads, so it's not a modest piece of legislation. It's a significant piece of legislation that changes an existing mechanism, and it has the support of business to do that. Business has been crying out for certainty, and not just for the last decade. The investment banks in the sector that I worked in prior to coming to parliament have been crying out for certainty since the early 2000s, saying, 'We just need a set of rules that will allow us to get going on this stuff and to really ramp up renewables.' Finally, as a government, we are bringing that certainty to this policy area.

There's one other part of the bill that I think is worth taking people through, and that is around the emitters and what they're going to be asked to do. Emitters will be given a baseline, and they will be asked to gradually reduce their emissions. We're starting with 4.9 per cent—I like to round it to five per cent—on their current level because want them to be active and incentivised to make changes to how they do it. One of the questions that has come up is about the integrity of the scheme. Emitters are allowed to use offsets where they can't reduce their levels, and questions have been raised about the integrity of that scheme. Let's talk about integrity and how that scheme is going to stand up to scrutiny, which is exactly what it should do.

We commissioned the independent review, the Chubb review, to ensure that the carbon-crediting framework has integrity so that we can maintain a strong and credible reputation, because we absolutely accept that that's required. The expert panel concluded that the scheme was sound, but they had a bunch of recommendations for ways that it could be made even more effective. There is going to be a very strong incentive for industrial emitters to reduce their emissions, but we recognise that many in those hard-to-abate areas are going to use credits.

We have accepted in principle the 16 recommendations that the panel made and we are working through them. They are to ensure that the scheme aligns with the most modern expectations of best practice. That means things like maximum transparency of the scheme information. It means tweaking it so that it encourages innovation in method development and project implementation. It also recognises that we can support greater participation, including by First Nation communities. We've agreed to the 16 recommendations of the Chubb review, and we're working with stakeholders on the implementation. I thank the people who have written to me with their concerns about the integrity of that scheme. We shared that concern. We've acted on it, and now we're working through it.

I've already said the safeguard mechanism is going to save around 205 million tonnes of emissions between now and 2030, and I've mentioned that it's been consistently supported by business groups like the BCA, the AiG and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, those organisations who are representing very large and some smaller groups. The contrast is the idea that we needed to go even further. As I said, I completely understand the desire for it to go further, but these are the 215 biggest emitters in the country that we're targeting. Unless we get emissions down, unless they bring down their emissions or start to bring down their emissions by that 4.9 per cent each year that we're going to require them to do, then we're going to struggle to achieve the targets we have set, and we have set ambitious targets.

I want to talk about the renewable energy targets that we have. We're talking about 82 per cent of our energy coming from renewable sources by 2030. There are not that many months to achieve our 2030 target. I don't know what we're down to, maybe 78 months, maybe 79 months, but it's rapidly disappearing now that we are in March. We're looking at achieving that 82 per cent reduction in less than 82 months now. That's a big job, and we know it is a massive task. What it means is that by 2030 will still be having around 18 per cent of fossil fuels, and so we know there needs to be a supply of those fossil fuels. To those whose argument is, 'This is all just too hard, it's not going to work,' we know that achieving the renewables and maintaining the supply of those fossil fuels is a balance that we have to achieve. We don't have a choice in achieving it if we want our economy to remain strong, and that is one of our primary concerns. We see renewables as an opportunity for jobs, particularly in regions and other areas that are reliant on fossil fuels. We know this can be a trigger for a whole lot of economic growth and diversification.

I was grateful that a couple of weeks ago that there were groups here in parliament talking to us about another concern they have on the safeguard reforms, and that is that the new industries that come on board might blow out the modelling. I want to be really clear about what has gone into that modelling. What we have said is that there is room in the estimates we have made to achieve the 205 million tonnes of abatement, but we have also factored in a buffer, an additional reserve of 17 million tonnes, which will absorb any of the modelled new changes. Obviously, it is also a scheme that will run for a long time and it needs to be reviewed. There will be reviews to measure how it goes. It is not a 'set and forget'. I appreciate that's been the pattern of the previous three governments, 'Set and forget, let's just do it, tick a box and say we have done it,' knowing that that is not way to do change well. You don't do it once and expect that it will work; you need to review it and keep monitoring it. That's what we will be doing, and that will be able to take into account any of the changes that occur. We will be monitoring and then adapting to those changes.

This is legislation that this parliament must support if as a nation we want to change the trajectory we have been on. I really urge people to look back at history, look at 2009. I remember the turning point on faith for people when a commitment to act on climate change was stymied by the joining together of two opposing parties, the coalition and the Greens. That led to Australia not getting a piece of legislation that would have been in place for nearly 14 years by now, and it would have made given us a totally different opportunity. That opportunity is lost, but the opportunity we have right now is there for the taking. It is profoundly disappointing but not surprising that the opposition will not be supporting this.

I urge the crossbenchers to think about the long-term opportunity this provides and the immediate opportunity it has to completely transform the way we see ourselves as a country striving for net zero. We're coming off more than a decade of this having been a frustration. Please, I urge the crossbenchers not to do that to the Australian people again. I urge you to think about the message we can send to the kids who come here and look down on this chamber, knowing that their future depends on the decisions that we make. A lot of us on this side are here not for our own generations but because we care about what's going to be left for our children and our grandchildren. This is the opportunity we have. We have a choice to end the uncertainty. We've made that choice; it's now up to the crossbench to decide where they want to be in Australia's history and, more importantly, the role they want to play in Australia's future. I understand that for many people it won't be a giant enough step—that's okay. A step is what takes you to the next one. It'll be profoundly disappointing if the vision that we have here is not able to be carried through, not just in this House but in the other place. To those on the crossbench: please think about this when you cast your vote.

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