Bridget McKenzie (Victoria, National Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

I just have a few questions for the minister around the issues that Senator Pocock's amendments go to, which is increasing the transparency and accountability for not just this government but future Australian governments in ensuring that our ambition on climate change and lowering emissions is reflected in measurement and accountability pieces throughout the government's systems so that Australians can be very clear on where the benefits of action on climate change occur and where there are clearly 'disbenefits', to quote some of the mayors from the mining communities' submission to the inquiry on this bill.

Minister, when I look at the nationally determined contribution, which was changed rightfully on your government winning the election and having a mandate to change our ambition as a nation on climate change, one of the first things you did was remove from that document a five-yearly review of the impacts of our climate ambition on rural and regional Australia. We have heard time and time again, in the inquiry and in this place and out in our communities, that, yes, on a pathway to net zero by 2050 there will be opportunities for our communities and our industries. But you're kidding yourselves if you don't think there are going to be challenges for these industries and these communities. It is not just the National Party that is saying it; it's the union movement as well.

Part of our role as legislators is to think about, when we implement these policies, making sure we mitigate some of the negative impacts on those communities. We all know who they are, and we all know where they are. It is why our government, in securing a pathway to net zero, combined that with over $20 billion of new money to support these communities, to seize the opportunities that a pathway to net zero by 2050 would bring, but to help them overcome the challenges. You are choosing to legislate your target, which you didn't have to do. You yourselves have admitted that it is unnecessary and largely symbolic. It'll cause a whole heap of unintended consequences, and I outlined some of those in my second reading speech last night.

But in setting that ambitious target without putting in place significant support and programs and projects to support rural and regional communities, you're setting them up to fail and you are causing an incredible amount of stress and concern in our mining communities, our agriculture communities, our manufacturing communities. So, my question to you—and I have a range of them—is: why did you remove the five-yearly clause that we got written in so that future governments, before they update our nationally determined contributions under the Paris Agreement, have actual data, not just on the benefits but on the impact? Even if you look at Europe and what they're going through at the moment, it's not all going to be plain sailing, so we need to be cognisant and aware of that so we can assist our communities on this journey.