Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Water) Share this | Hansard source

As I said, I was not of the understanding that it was a requirement of any senator in this place that a detailed briefing on policy required the attendance of the minister or else the person would not attend. I would have thought, if you were interested in content, you might have been interested in attending. Whatever the reason for it, as I said, the Greens are entitled not to attend if they do not wish. But I am not sure that the criticism that they do not know what is in the amendments holds much water.

There has been an enormous amount of consultation with the community on this debate. I described earlier today some 13—I think it was 13, but I could be wrong—inquiries that Senate, House or joint committees conducted in relation to climate change matters since we came to government. Let us consider just this legislation alone. It has been in draft form to one Senate committee. It has been again to a Senate committee post the bill being introduced. It was introduced into the parliament in May. It has been before the Senate previously, when the Greens voted against the legislation. It has now come back before the parliament at this point. There have been a green paper, a white paper and substantial consultation in relation to this legislation. It is the case that some final amendments now have been negotiated with the opposition. We hope that the opposition will therefore support the legislation. Without the opposition’s support, this legislation will not become law. It is quite clear that the crossbenchers—the Greens and Senator Fielding, which is a rather unusual alliance—and others will vote against this legislation.