Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too stand to speak on the Clean Energy Legislation (Carbon Tax Repeal) Bill 2013 [No. 2] and related bills. Having had the opportunity to listen to 33 hours of debate on this suite of bills and all the things that have been said by those opposite—the Greens and the Labor Party—I am really quite astounded by the contributions we have heard. I did not include the Palmer United Party there because they have only just arrived—and they made a rather sensible and rational contribution to this debate yesterday, so I feel very confident that they get what we are trying to do here.

We seem to be having a debate about whether climate change is real but not about the real issue, which is: how are we as legislators going to deal with the climate challenges that face this country and this world and our place as a player in this world? I would suggest that what we should really be doing today is debating how we deal with climate change. Senator Wong commented this morning that she did not necessarily agree with the comments of Senator Lazarus yesterday in relation to this bill but did respect that he had a position to put—and that is exactly what he did. So I would say to Labor and the Greens: let's just accept the fact that we all believe in the science of climate change and we also believe that we need to do something about it. However, what we do have here is disagreement about how we should address this issue. I can say for myself that I believe we have some climate challenges ahead of us, and I am prepared to play my part and do what I can in supporting the necessary changes and implementing the necessary legislation and associated instruments so that we deal with the issue of climate change.

Senator Ludlam stood here yesterday and said, 'Minister Hunt is deceptive.' I cannot think of anything Minister Hunt has said that is deceptive. He has been quite clear that he believes the best way for us to address the climate challenges we have ahead of us is through his package, of which the Emissions Reduction Fund is the centrepiece. Last week we heard from a number of people in relation to the Carbon Farming Initiative, which has been successfully implemented over the last two years—though some changes need to be made to it to make it more streamlined and obviously to allow there to be a market for carbon. This is an initiative that was put into this place by the Labor Party and the Greens but it seems that, just because the coalition think it is a great idea and would like to continue it, it automatically has to be opposed.

Senator Ludlam said: 'I have nothing but contempt for those opposite.' I am not sure that throwing around comments like that is the best way to get a debate going about something as important as this. Another comment from those at the other end of the chamber yesterday was that the whole process of repealing the carbon tax was because we have an overt desire to bankrupt the clean energy sector. Nothing could be further from the truth, and nothing could be more ridiculous than making those sorts of comments. We really need to get back to the facts of the matter and the basis of the bill.

We universally agree in this place that we have to achieve a five per cent reduction in emissions by 2020 based on 2000 emissions. It has been said in this place that this is pathetic, that Australia is not playing its part and will be left behind by the rest of the world because this is just tokenism.