Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Five days ago when I started my remarks on the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Bill 2007 I indicated my disquiet that this was yet a further example of the lack of consultation that characterises the way in which the government develops its policies. This bill has been looked at by the Senate Standing Committee on Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, which held a public hearing on 3 September. That public hearing was characterised by groups like the Australian Industry Greenhouse Network, which represents major Australian emitters, indicating that the government had not consulted them when the bill was drafted. Likewise, state governments indicated that they were not consulted. Environment groups testified that the reporting thresholds were too high and that more information should be publicly disclosed. In the short public discussion through that process, we saw great problems with the way that the government has ignored sitting down with stakeholders to try and make sure that the piece of legislation that is before us is appropriate. Certainly the opposition has come to the conclusion that, regrettably, the way in which this bill is couched has the potential to slow action. It might also undermine, at least in the short term, some of the initiatives that have been put in place by the state government.

Labor have a different tradition and a modern attitude to the way in which we should put in place these pieces of public policy. That has been characterised by previous governments. Certainly the intent of new leadership is to show that, by sitting down with stakeholders, we can achieve outcomes that are solid and can be more readily achieved. The Prime Minister has come into this place quite often and talked about coal and has indicated from across the chamber that he believed the opposition’s attitude was a threat to the jobs of coalminers. That was a total fix and was spin being placed on the reality of Labor’s position. That has now been proven by the joint announcement last week of the ACF, the Australian Conservation Foundation, and the CFMEU Mining and Energy Division. When two parties to a discussion about public policy like the ACF and the CFMEU Mining and Energy Division come forward with an agreed policy about a direction for action on climate change, it shows the paucity of the position that has been often put by the Prime Minister.

Both Don Henry, the Executive Director of ACF, and Tony Maher, the General President of the CFMEU Mining and Energy Division, indicated their unanimous support and called for the government and the opposition to commit to (1) setting science based legislative targets to cut greenhouse emissions, (2) substantially increasing the existing mandatory renewable energy target and (3) joining the international effort by ratifying the Kyoto protocol before the end of 2007. Tony Maher went on further to say that he felt that the Prime Minister and not conservationists were the biggest threat to coalminers. The main debate has been going on not at the extreme ends of this debate but in the middle. Tony Maher indicated that it is clearer day by day:

That decade of inaction means that we’re a decade behind where we need to be in terms of clean coal technology.

There we have it. We have a different attitude to the way in which we can go about ensuring that we reach the outcomes. We can reach those outcomes if we have a government that embraces inclusion rather than a government—such as the Howard government—that has been very exclusive in its dealings about public policy. Who else can contribute to the way in which we achieve outcomes that are necessary for climate change? In this case, the analogy is correct: the work is at the coalface. The point is that these things are going to be implemented at every part of the chain. If we do it domestically then we are better placed to not only dictate to but, more importantly, assist those with whom we trade in the wider global market for our resources to ensure that they use those resources in the cleanest way possible. To consider that the emerging giants like China and India are not interested in ensuring that their use of our coal is the best and cleanest way is to not give them credit for their understanding. They recognise that they cannot develop and grow their economies in the absence of ensuring that they treat their environment in the most sustainable way possible.

This is the challenge for us all. That is why it is absolutely churlish of the government not to recognise that, by not taking that step and ratifying the Kyoto protocol, they place themselves outside of the discussions that will continue. Their catchcry is to act in Australia’s best interest. We now come to a stage where the next step—a multilateral international agreement on climate change flowing on from the Kyoto protocol—is the game in town. To put Australia outside of the processes to ensure that that is going to happen simply seems irresponsible and not in Australia’s best interest.

So we confront an opportunity in the run-up to the next election for the Australian public to sit in judgement on two sets of policies or directions in this area which are polls apart. They can decide that, after a decade of inaction, the attitude that we should see is one that is in some parts softly-softly but, more drastically, is done in closed quarters, without open debate. Contrast that with the way the opposition leader, Kevin Rudd, has ensured that, in the development of Labor’s policies, we sat down with stakeholders to have an acute understanding of the way matters economic, matters environmental and matters social are very important to the challenge of confronting climate change. So when we look at a piece of legislation such as the one before us it should in fact become a tool for us to reach the goals that we need. It is important that we get the best tools, the most appropriate way of going forward.

It is interesting that in the run-up to APEC we had this indication by the Prime Minister that, by getting climate change on the agenda, this would be one of the most significant discussions that we would see. The Sydney declaration, whilst in its aspirational sense is perhaps of some importance, I contend is of little importance compared with the journey that we have been on because it is based on an assumption that countries such as China, which were outside those target processes of Kyoto, were in some way not engaged in the continuing debate. If you look at the number of countries that are involved in the Kyoto processes and the Kyoto protocol, it is much greater than the number that had the target set as protocol 1 countries of the Kyoto protocol. I think what we really need to see is that once and for all we have a national government that is willing to show leadership on this issue and that is willing to sit down with all the stakeholders—the industry groups, the state government and those within the community who have a special interest in these matters—and together go forward.

As I said earlier in this debate, that was the attitude that characterised the Hawke-Keating years, when there were negotiations where people sat down and got directions that were agreed by all parties—that feeling of consensus, accords and other processes that enable us to go forward on a complete basis of inclusion in the best interests of the Australian community. (Time expired)

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

After 11 years of inaction and denial on climate change, the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Bill 2007 represents a hastily cobbled together attempt by the government to look as though it is doing something, just before the election is called. The bill establishes a single national framework for reporting greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption and production by corporations by 1 July 2008. By the 2010-11 financial year the reporting framework will apply to approximately 700 companies that emit more than 500,000 tonnes.

This bill has been developed, however, without appropriate consultation with state governments, industry bodies or environment groups. Given that the National Emissions Trading Taskforce, established by state governments, put out a discussion paper last year, it is extraordinary that the federal government has not consulted with them properly. Given the importance the economic transformation to a carbon constrained economy will have for industry, it is extraordinary that there has not been proper consultation with them. And, given the importance of climate change as the moral challenge for our generation, it is extraordinary that there has not been proper consultation with environment groups. But of course this is a government that has been in denial over climate change for 11 years.

In 2003 the Treasurer put forward a submission to cabinet for an emissions trading scheme. It was supported by his department, it was supported by the Department of the Environment and Heritage, it was supported by the Department of Industry, Tourism and Resources and it was supported by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. But it was not supported by the Prime Minister, a Prime Minister stuck in the past and not capable of making the leap forward into the policies that are required of a modern government in the 21st century, a Prime Minister who does not have the support of the majority of his own cabinet colleagues. Even they have realised that he is so out of touch with what is needed for leadership in this nation in 2007 and beyond that they informed the Prime Minister collectively last week that they had come to the view that it was time he retired.

We also know that the basis of the Treasurer’s submission to cabinet in 2003 was the number of reports that were produced by the emissions trading group in the Australian Greenhouse Office. The group did all the research and produced the reports but the government’s response was not to implement the policy but to abolish that group. When Labor raised—as we have continued to do day after day, month after month and year after year—the need for a price on carbon and the need for market based mechanisms to drive the transformation to a carbon constrained economy by having a national emissions trading scheme, the Prime Minister’s response and rhetoric up until last year was that this was a Labor tax. I remember debating the current minister’s predecessor, Senator—

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Water Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Were you a senator then?

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Unlike you, Minister, he was prepared to debate at forums occasionally but not very often; he was prepared to engage in that. He used to argue that emissions trading was a tax, that this was Labor’s new tax that was going to ruin the economy and jobs. But of course what we have here is finally a government being dragged into the end of the last decade. That is where they are up to now.

I say that because in 1997, when Australia signed the Kyoto protocol, we signed it on the basis that market based mechanisms were the key to driving that change. We signed it on the basis that, to quote the Prime Minister of the time, it was a ‘win for the environment and a win for Australian jobs’. We got a very good deal out of Kyoto. We got the second highest target, of 108 per cent, in the industrialised world. Only Iceland has a higher target.

But we got more than that because, in order to get Australia in as part of the system, the countries which met at Kyoto in 1997 agreed that you could take into account land-use changes and they agreed that that could be retrospective to 1990. So we got this 108 per cent target, but in reality it was much more generous than that because we know that if it were not for the decisions of the New South Wales and Queensland state Labor governments to stop broad-scale land clearing in their states Australia would be massively over our very generous target. As it is it, is unlikely that we will hit our target anyway.

If you look at the projections from the Australian Greenhouse Office, you note—and these are the last ones that I looked at—they have us increasing our emissions by 27 per cent by 2020. We know that we need to stabilise emissions and turn them down. Australia is one of the few industrialised countries on earth to be going in completely the wrong direction. If you look at the countries that have been successful in driving down their emissions while having sustained economic growth, such as the United Kingdom, Denmark and Germany, one of the lessons you learn is that they have used market based mechanisms to drive that change through. They have recognised that those mechanisms are an essential part of driving that new technology. When we talk about the policy changes that are there, it is not just about having emissions trading; it is also, in terms of ratifying Kyoto, about getting access to the clean development mechanism and other mechanisms that do engage a developing world to drive that change through.

You only have to look at the draft Sydney declaration and compare it with what came out of the Sydney declaration to realise how isolated Australia is on these positions, because the two documents are very different. The original draft declaration that went forward spoke about welcoming ‘the initiative by the United States to convene a group of major economies to seek agreement on a detailed contribution to a post-2012 global arrangement’. But after this was added ‘under the UNFCCC’. And then this was added:

We pledge our support for the initiative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations in convening a High-Level Event on Climate Change.

The countries that have ratified Kyoto—which is every industrialised country in the world except for Australia, the United States and Kazakhstan; they are the only three countries to have signed the Kyoto protocol but not ratified it—want truly global action. They want action through the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Later this year, in a couple of months time, there will be a really significant meeting which will be held in Bali, and at that conference there will be two streams: firstly, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change; and, secondly, the third meeting of the parties to the Kyoto protocol. They will be discussing what the post-2012 changes and improvements will be to the Kyoto protocol.

Quite clearly Kyoto was a first step. As with all international agreements such as this, the nations of the industrialised world, because they were the cause of the problem and they also had the economic strength to show leadership and take action first, were given specific binding targets under Kyoto. The task is to get the rest of the world including China and India to move forward. But it is very hard when, having negotiated such an extraordinarily generous deal, Australia walked away from its commitments under the Kyoto protocol.

The post-2012 regime will not be something new. We have forgotten that there is none of this rhetoric about new Kyoto and all that nonsense—that has all disappeared, gone. Even the Australian has stopped its front-page headlines of ‘Kyoto dead’ and there being a new framework. It has stopped that. It has come to the reality that Kyoto is the driving force that everyone except for those three countries has decided upon. The question is: how you influence the post-2012 regime? Australia, because of our vulnerable environment of where we are positioned and our climate, has a lot to lose by dangerous climate change. We also have a lot to gain because of where we are positioned through the economic opportunities that would come about if we were not isolated on this issue.

At that Bali conference, the post-2012 discussions, which will not be finalised there, will largely be influenced by what is happening now. I hope that the minister understands that the first commitment period of Kyoto has not even started yet—it is 2008 to 2012—let alone decisions about how it will take place in practice. Of course there have to be improvements. We are talking about a global economic transformation, about mechanisms such as the clean development mechanism being a driving force there. We are talking about the joint implementation measures for which Australia could have significant economic opportunities for investment if we were a part of it. Those changes will influence what the second commitment period post 2012 will look like. But we are not a part those discussions and our officials and bureaucrats go along to those meetings and just take notes. They are not able to participate; they are not around the table.

I hope that Australia is able to be represented at both forums. Certainly, if the election was being held at the time it should be—which is right now—then there would be the opportunity. If Labor are elected we will ratify the Kyoto protocol and once again be a part of the global system. We know the pressure that would then be on the United States to come in and be part of the global solution. Indeed, the structure of Kyoto is an American design. It was not designed by the Europeans. It was designed bearing in mind what George Bush senior’s administration did in dealing with the sulphur dioxide issue in emissions trading and having those market based mechanisms there. I think it is tragic that whilst the rest of the world is moving ahead—and I have sat in an emissions trading room in London where emissions trading is actually taking place successfully—all we are doing here in legislation in Australia in 2007 are some preconditions for emissions trading. Way back in 1998 the Sydney Futures Exchange spent millions of dollars developing a system because they wanted Sydney to be at the centre of the action when it comes to what will be the world’s biggest market.

I also want to take the opportunity in this debate on climate change to reflect on an ad I have just seen on television, an extraordinary ad about the Climate Clever campaign, given that during question time on 16 occasions in four days the Prime Minister said that this campaign did not exist. There were 16 occasions over four days. During question time on 23 and 24 May the Prime Minister denied on five occasions that he had approved a climate change advertising campaign and then during the sitting week, 28 to 31 May, for a further 11 questions he remained in denial, misleading parliament 16 times over four days. What is the basis of this policy? Using taxpayers’ funds to pretend that the government is actually doing something.

There is nothing wrong with the idea that individuals should take action to reduce their carbon footprint. There is nothing wrong with that at all. But what is required is government leadership. It is absurd to suggest that the climate change challenge can be met by people turning off their taps or taking individual action. It actually needs leadership from government and from industry. That is why you need an emissions trading system. That is why you need a significantly increased mandatory renewable energy target. Unless you have that, you will not get the drive in investment in solar, in wind, in tidal, in geothermal and in the innovation that is required.

In 1996 we were 10 per cent of the world’s solar industry. Today we are two per cent. We have gone down enormously during that period. We have companies packing up and moving overseas. We are the only country in the world where renewable energy production, manufacturing plants, are actually closing down. They are closing down because the government has not put those mechanisms in place.

The government’s response was to have a campaign that it is so ashamed of in terms of its record that it denies the campaign even exists. When we asked very specific questions in this parliament about the little old lady with the kettle—we clearly had copies of the ads and waved them around in parliament—the government denied it because the government has, of course, been in denial about climate change. In the Age on 30 May, this is what Michelle Grattan said about that process:

It was the day that John Howard looked panicked rather than prime ministerial.

…            …            …

Howard had got himself into an absurd and unnecessary position by trying to deny the existence of planned climate change advertising on the ground it does not exist until it gets the ministerial tick. He simply sounds devious, stubborn and slightly crazy. He has, over several parliamentary days created a bigger problem than he needed to have.

It is not surprising that the government is embarrassed about its performance on climate change. It has been a part of holding the world back when it comes to taking action on climate change. That is why, at the 11th hour of its term, the government is introducing legislation not to have a national emissions trading scheme but just to have the first step to set up a precondition.

There is no more apparent area in which the government shows that it is simply incapable of providing the leadership that is required to move the nation forward than that of climate change. Climate change requires guts, which the Treasurer certainly does not have. He has just sat back and allowed the Prime Minister to do it all, even though he had an emissions trading proposal before the cabinet in 2003. Climate change requires courage and vision in the interests of future generations. (Time expired)

Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Water Resources) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

in reply—I thank honourable members for their contributions. A national high-quality greenhouse and energy dataset is a foundation requirement for establishing a successful emissions trading system and informing all Australian governments in their decisions. The National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Bill 2007 will establish Australia’s first nationwide mandatory system for collecting high-quality greenhouse and energy data from industry. This bill will allow for a more comprehensive and accurate picture of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions and energy use than ever before.

One of the bill’s strengths is its provisions to reduce the number of reports that businesses are required to submit under the current patchwork of programs across jurisdictions. In some cases, the number of reports will reduce from eight down to one. We will consult widely with industry and state and territory governments in coming months to ensure that government reporting requirements are streamlined as soon as practicable.

Because of the urgent need for data to underpin the introduction of the Australian emissions trading system, which the government intends to implement by 2011, discussions on streamlining will not delay the collection of data under this system. The bill will see the national greenhouse and energy reporting system up and running by 1 July 2008. I thank the participants in the debate and commend the bill to the House.

Phillip Barresi (Deakin, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The original question was that this bill be now read a second time. To this the honourable member for Kingsford Smith has moved as an amendment that all words after ‘That’ be omitted with a view to substituting other words. The question now is that the words proposed to be omitted stand part of the question.

Question agreed to.

Original question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.