Eric Abetz (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Minister for Fisheries, Forestry and Conservation) Share this | Hansard source

In relation to the honourable senator’s question, what we have is a desperate attempt by the Australian Labor Party to deal themselves into this debate. As I was able to inform the Senate yesterday, the issue of greenhouse gas emissions was something that we took on board immediately we came into government with our then environment minister making a statement in 1996—the very first year we came into government. Within a year or two of that, we established the Australian Greenhouse Office to deal with exactly these issues.

It is informative that the honourable senator selectively quotes the odd country or so in Europe. But it is interesting that the country of Germany, for example, relies on nuclear energy. That is an interesting consideration. Also, in relation to Australia, we should keep in mind that a lot of the fossil fuel that is expended in Australia is expended because we are one of the breadbaskets of the world. And I pay tribute to the agricultural and primary sectors for the way they have been dealing with the issue of trying to decrease greenhouse gas emissions. But make no mistake: those countries that are forced to buy foodstuffs from us may well be confronted with higher costs and that, of course, would not be of benefit to those countries that rely on our agricultural produce and those people who rely on it.

The release of the UK’s draft climate change bill proposes to make legally binding the target of at least a 60 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from 1990 levels by 2050. But the bill is undergoing a consultation phase and no final decisions on the elements of the draft legislation have yet been made. So let us just put all this in perspective. This is what the Labor Party continually does: it seeks to assert something as fact, whereas in reality the UK have put forward a proposal—a draft bill—and are determining whether or not they should go down that path.

What better proposal could there be than that announced by the Prime Minister yesterday? He showed world leadership in announcing the $200 million fund to deal with the issue of deforestation. You see, that is what you get when you have an experienced Prime Minister, an experienced government, saying, ‘Let’s forget all the hype, let’s look at practical, workable solutions that are sensible and will not cost one single Australian job but could reduce the carbon dioxide emissions of the world by 20 per cent.’

Australia has a vision for the world, to help the world meet the targets that are required. The Labor Party thinks that if they can somehow reduce Australian emissions by one-half and cost thousands of Australians their jobs they will have done something useful. It is a lot better for the environment to adopt the Howard proposal to assist South-East Asian countries not to deforest. I would be very interested to hear whether— (Time expired)