Kate Lundy (ACT, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Sport and Recreation) Share this | Hansard source

It seems that for some reason the minister has got a bit lost in his efforts to try to talk this out today. That is okay by us; we are happy to keep debating and moving through the long list of amendments on this bill. It is a bill that fails dramatically on just about all fronts. I note that the former environment minister, Robert Hill, clearly understood the need for a climate change trigger. On 10 December 1999, Robert Hill released a consultation paper on the possible application of a greenhouse trigger under the EPBC Act. At the time he stated:

Introducing a greenhouse trigger would provide another measure for addressing our international responsibilities in relation to climate change and ensuring Australia meets its Kyoto target.

I think that Robert Hill at least understood the need for a climate change trigger and he knew that it was a part of a comprehensive approach that does include Kyoto, emissions trading and support for renewable energy.

But I think that the time when we had a minister who understood the need for a climate change trigger and, indeed, the impact of climate change has long gone. The moderates in the Liberal Party have obviously taken a hiding and we have got an extreme government with a pretty extreme environment minister, who is now trying to tell a new story, a story that does not include a climate change trigger. I was appalled, and I know my colleagues were appalled, when the environment minister told the Senate the day before yesterday—and I think that he may have reiterated it yesterday—that Labor’s push for a climate change trigger was an anticoal amendment to the environment protection law. Isn’t that interesting? Senator Hill was never accused of being anticoal. Labor does support Australia’s coal industry and supports measures to develop clean coal. As our leader, Kim Beazley, has stated:

If the Labor Party is elected we will go down the path of clean coal and renewables. It is as simple as that.

And it is as simple as that. I note that the shadow environment minister, my colleague Mr Albanese, has referred to the importance of clean coal technology in at least 73 speeches and media releases. I think that that is a pretty clear message. I also note that Mr Albanese was the keynote speaker at the Clean Coal Conference, to which the government did not even bother to send a representative—and that really says it all. On the point about environmental assessment, of course it is about looking at each proposal on its merit. What we are dealing with here is a minister scrambling about, trying to find some cover, given the dramatic change in this government’s position since Senator Hill was environment minister.