Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. What does the Prime Minister have to say to the people of Newcastle, Mount Isa, Gladstone and Latrobe, whose mayors have called on the federal government not to impose the Emissions Trad-ing Scheme on their com-munities in the inter-ests of protecting the economic and job futures of their citizens? When will jobs take priority over your unwil-lingness as Prime Minister to admit it when you get it wrong? What is more important—your ego or jobs?

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The last part of the question is out of order.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Cook for his question given his spectacular contribution to the debate yester-day in the House of Representatives where he called for an extension of the government’s first home owners bonus—a little blip there in terms of opposition tactics, but never mind; let it be so recorded.

The honourable member asks a question about the impact of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme in various regions in Australia. The government—firstly, in relation to the emissions-intensive trade-ex-posed sector; secondly, in assisting the electricity industry through the Electricity Sector Adjustment Scheme; thirdly, through the climate change adjustment fund; and, fourthly, through an assistance package for households—has put in place a set of mechanisms to ease the transition to a less carbon-intensive economy. That is the right and responsible course of action.

As the honourable member and any honest participant in this debate would know, those opposite had 12 years to get an emissions trading scheme right. Do I hear from those opposite a single word about why they waited 12 years to do nothing? It was because they did not believe in it, because they were simply climate change sceptics. That was until the member for Wentworth, the Leader of the Opposition, decided to make his run for the leadership—and then there was an attack on the member for Bradfield over his position on climate change—dressing himself in pale green colours in order to obtain the leadership. Then we got an attack on the brown side by the member for Higgins; namely, the Leader of the Opposition in waiting. And what do we do? We track to the right; we track to the brown side of the argument.

What people expect of governments or alternative governments in this country is consistency. We are getting on with the business of implementing an appropriate response to carbon pollution reduction. Those opposite are riddled with inconsistencies.