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

Thank you. The point I am making, for Senator Joyce's interest, is that you need more money put into research and development, not less. We should be increasing the money. We are low in the OECD rankings of the spend. If you spend money on research and development, it flows through into jobs. There is no question about that. It also flows through into the CRCs and into small companies that are engaged in research. You get research clusters, and that is where we need to go if we are going to be a clever country that uses fewer resources and gets more from what we do. That is what you do with R&D.

I can tell you now that the agricultural sector is desperate for more R&D funding and we need more. The question now is: where is the coalition going to get the money for R&D for agriculture? Where is the coalition going to get the money to support its so-called direct action? Where is the money from Senator Joyce to pay the polluters, because that is what he wants to do? That is what he wants to do—pay the polluters. He can go back to his constituency and explain to them how he wants to take money out of the pockets of single parents, money out of the pockets of people on Newstart, so that he can pay the polluters. He can let his friend Clive Palmer and others off taxes. That is exactly where the coalition want to go, but the Greens do not.

The Greens want a more caring society. We want one where we care for the environment and care for people, and we want to make sure that we raise the money from those who can afford to pay, which is just and fair. What we need to hear from both sides is: where is the money coming from?