Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage, Senator Campbell. Given the government’s emphatic statements over its term of office that Australia will meet its very generous Kyoto target of an increase of eight per cent in greenhouse gas emissions over 1990 levels, why has the minister started this week to back-pedal from that claim, now saying that Australia ‘is likely to meet’ the target, Australia ‘will struggle to meet’ the target and that we are ‘one of the five countries that might’ get there? What advice or information has the minister now received in the lead-up to the meeting of the parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change in Nairobi in a few weeks time to indicate that Australia will not meet, is unlikely to meet or will struggle to meet its Kyoto target, and why is that the case?