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

Before the debate is resumed I remind the House that it has been agreed to earlier that a general debate be allowed covering this bill, the Carbon Credits (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2011 and the Australian National Registry of Emissions Units Bill 2011.

Debate resumed on the motion:

That this bill be now read a second time.

to which the following amendment was moved:

That all words after 'That' be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

'the House decline to give the bill a second reading until the terms of the regulations giving effect to the provisions of the bill are laid before the House'.

Laura Smyth (La Trobe, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to be able to make a contribution to this debate in relation to a very important reform which the Labor government is embarking upon, the Carbon Farming Initiative. I note that my time will be somewhat truncated, but I hope to make a few introductory remarks at this stage and some further remarks later in the afternoon on the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Bill 2011. We know that the Carbon Farming Initiative recognises climate change as a very real risk and a very real occurrence. It is a scheme which provides clear economic value to actions which will store or reduce our carbon pollution. At the last election, Labor made a commitment to give farmers, landholders and forest growers an opportunity to access carbon markets. The bill delivers on that commitment, although we know that the coalition is doing its best to thwart the Carbon Farming Initiative and the farmers and landowners who have a very real interest in this initiative.

It is another example of the opposition throwing a wrecking ball at very important and very timely legislation. It is curious that they are doing it on the basis, they say, that there is an absence of detail, that there is not sufficient detail for them to be able to make a complete assessment of the initiative. Detail—this is from people who brought us a budget reply which accidentally missed the economy, jobs, spending, savings and, in short, the budget. Detail—this is from people who brought us election commitments which had apparently been summed on the back of an envelope; commitments which missed the new detail of an $11 billion discount. These are people who have failed to put forward a single constructive and thought-through policy during this term. So it is a bit rich for them to be coming here today and talking about detail, particularly when we are aware that the Carbon Farming Initiative has been the subject of such extensive and comprehensive discussion and consultation with the land sector and with various other groups who stand to benefit from the initiative. After all, it is not about detail. I suspect, in fact, that it is really a typo, because it is possibly another D-word that they are concerned about, and that is denial. They are actually talking about denial of the science relating to climate change, denial of the fact that carbon pollution is a risk to our environment and to our economy. It is denial of the looming reality of dangerous climate change to our environment and to our economy—denial and delay. This is a delay to accommodate the division within their own ranks about this very important initiative. Their plan is to try to sideline this major reform on the basis that they have not seen the detail. They are trying to delay a reform which has been the subject of extensive consultation with the agricultural sector and which has been positively received.

All of this sounds eerily familiar—this concern and artifice about a lack of detail—because it is exactly the same line that they tried to run in relation to our legislation about plain packaging for cigarettes: 'We haven't seen the detail. We can't possibly commit to this, not without seeing every last detail of the regulations.' We all saw how very thin that argument was. The public saw it. The media saw it. We realised very quickly that their claims about needing detail were just a sham. It was all artifice; it was all designed to cover up a bitter division within their own ranks, just as it is now. We saw through that and we see through this. The agricultural sector will see through it. Those who participated in the consultations—and they rank many in number—will see through it. And the Australian public will see through it.

We know that farmers and landholders want access to carbon markets worth hundreds of millions of dollars each year for regional and rural Australia. Farmers and landholders are looking for a system which will credit them for their carbon storage and their abatement activities. We know this because there has been substantial consultation over a long period of time with the sector. We know that agricultural emissions levels in Australia are amongst the highest across all developed countries. We know and farmers and landholders know that there are vast and underutilised opportunities to increase carbon storage in Australian soils and to reduce our emissions as a result. At the Climate Commission forum here in Parliament House a few weeks ago, we certainly heard from some of those agriculturalists who reflected that they certainly understood implicitly the value of reducing carbon pollution through the types of abatement mechanisms which this bill contemplates. The initiative contemplated in the bill gives those agriculturalists an opportunity to voluntarily take part in abatement projects for approval. It will allow them to sell offset credits from approved activities. We know from farmers, from other landholders and we also know from experts that the initiative contemplated by this bill is a good one. In the time remaining to me, I want to quote from the Garnaut Review 2011, whichremarked:

The government’s proposed Carbon Farming Initiative is an important first step in encouraging abatement in the rural sector. It will provide valuable lessons in Australia and internationally on the administration of land sector incentives. It will also lead to ‘learning by doing’ improvements in technologies applied to emissions reduction and sequestration in the land sector.

So the government, farmers, landholders and experts all know that the Carbon Farming Initiative will be incredibly valuable to the land sector. We all know that the Carbon Farming Initiative will be effective in reducing the impact of climate change. But apparently no-one told the opposition. Through his amendments to this bill, the member for Flinders has essentially told farmers that the coalition is prepared to delay them receiving benefits under the bill. So the coalition would, once again, much rather play politics than support the farmers that they profess to represent in this place. This is an extremely important part of the government's overall effort to combat carbon pollution. We all know that the government is working very hard to finalise the carbon pricing arrangements which will have a transformational effect on our economy and support a move to clean energy industries. In the meantime, this bill will help us to start harnessing the abatement opportunities which are already presented by farming practices.

Peter Slipper (Fisher, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! I apologise to the member for La Trobe. It being 1.45 pm the debate is interrupted in accordance with standing order 43. The honourable member will have the opportunity of contributing her remarks at a later hour, with the resumption of the debate