Ron Boswell (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, it is subterfuge. We are debating the greatest cause of job losses in Australia, and it is hard to believe that it is the ALP that is doing it. They are doing it to their own blue-collar workers because they have probably made some pact with the soft, leafy suburb sections of their party. It is just a free kick in front of goal for the conservative forces in every working class suburb. I have seen the polls just falling away overnight. I indicated that in a Galaxy poll the figure had gone up to 60 per cent not wanting to do anything before Copenhagen. Those wanting to go ahead had fallen from 34 per cent in a poll a week before to 27 per cent. If you take the Greens out of that 27 per cent, and that is 12 per cent and going up and the government vote is going down, you end up with about 12 per cent support.

If we are going to go through this facade of presenting legislation to the parliament, then the Australian people want to know that what we are debating is a true and accurate reflection of what is in the bill. It is not, and it never was since Copenhagen. They also want to know where our share of the $30 billion is coming from, and the $100 billion we have to pay the non-developed countries. Until the government tells us these things, they are just not telling the truth. They are not telling the Australian people what it is all about. I have tried and tried with Senator Milne—we often do not agree on things; sometimes we do, as we do on this issue—to find out what our share of the $30 billion is, what our share of the $100 billion is and how we are going to fund it. It is not small bikkies; it is big bikkies. The government has to tell us these things. They have to tell the electorate. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time. That is what you are trying to do by presenting this ETS bill. Your assumptions on small business, pensioners, overseas trade and everything else are wrong. This matter has to go to a committee.