Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I inform the Senate that the President has received the following letter, dated 12 March 2009, from Senator Brandis:

Dear Mr President,

Pursuant to standing order 75, I give notice that today I propose to move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:

The failure of the Rudd Labor Government to consider the interests of the state of Queensland, and, in particular the Queensland economy, in the development of the proposed Emissions Trading Scheme.

(George Brandis)

Senator for Queensland

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today’s debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At the request of Senator Brandis, I move:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:The failure of the Rudd Labor Government to consider the interests of the State of Queensland, and, in particular the Queensland economy, in the development of the proposed Emissions Trading Scheme.

The Rudd Labor government has devised a policy that will directly affect the working families of Queensland. It is only the Rudd Labor government that has come to this current global financial crisis with a policy that will take people out of work, and so they will not be able to meet the payments on their house or meet the payments on their car. They will be out of work and out on the street, not because of the global financial crisis, not because of global warming, but because of the Labor government’s policy.

This policy will be particularly bad for Queensland. When we look at the issues that surround Queensland, we see that it is the working families from areas such as Mackay, Moranbah, Emerald and Blackwater who are involved in the coal industry and who will straightaway be in the middle sights of the gun. We in Australia must remember that our major export is coal, but the coal that we export makes up only four per cent of the coal consumed by the world. The major reserves of coal in the world are located in the United States, China and India, and those countries are where the jobs will go when this Labor government’s ETS is introduced. The government will be exporting the jobs of Australian working families to the United States of America and to China. Mongolia will not have an ETS, and it will be a big exporter of coal. We will have direct attacks from Indonesia on Australian exports. Indonesia has become very capable in taking over Australia’s share of coal exports. South Africa has the ability to deliver metallurgical, coking and thermal coal.

Coal exports are going to go out the door; they are going to be put under threat because of a Labor government policy: the emissions trading scheme. The scheme has a very nice name for something that is actually not going to change the climate. It is not going to affect the climate one iota. It is a political gesture that will put Australian working families out into the street, and at the epicentre of this storm will be the state of Queensland. We have to note that, in the last year, coal prices have dropped from $140 a tonne to $70 a tonne. This is the pressure that this issue is currently generating.

We also have to note that, of the 30,000 Australians who are employed in the coal industry, 18,000 are in Queensland. For every one person who is employed in the coal industry, another two to three people are directly associated with it—for instance, through transport or contracting. It means that in excess of 50,000 people are directly involved with coal. There is also the multiplier effect from the money that comes from this industry. Chemists, schools and service industries are all affected. There are in excess of 200,000 people associated with the wealth generated from coal. Yet the Labor Party has gone on a solo crusade that will not change a thing with the climate but will put these people out into the street.

It is a disgrace that we have to stand here and try to do the job of the Australian Workers Union of protecting Australian working families. There is real evidence that people will lose their jobs. What has happened to the Australian Workers Union? What has happened to their ability to protect jobs in Queensland? Why have they gone silent? Why don’t they have the courage to stand up for their own members? What has happened there? It is because this issue is not politically correct. These people are going to lose their jobs over political correctness—over a political gesture that will reduce carbon emissions by five per cent of 1½ per cent of the world’s emissions; it is 0.075 of one per cent of a particle, of which only three per cent is human induced.

People will lose their jobs, and this gesture will have no effect on the global climate. Queensland has been put up as a sacrifice by Kevin from Queensland, the Prime Minister of Australia. He lauds himself as being from Queensland but he puts up his own state to be held to account for a political gesture. If it is not the mining industry then it is the agricultural industry or the grazing industry, with a potential overload of costs of 20 per cent on an industry which at its best only makes a four per cent margin. These jobs will also be held to account. What about the abattoirs that will be exposed? What about the sugar mills that will be exposed?

Maybe they believe that the tourism industry is going to be able to take up the slack. However, we find that the emissions trading scheme will definitely affect those who rely on the fuel that propels the plane through the air—aviation fuel. It is up for a tax, so we are going to put at risk those marginal destinations. We have heard evidence already that people such as Virgin airlines will make the only logical decision and stop the flights to regional Queensland, especially to the north of our state. These people will once more be sacrificed at the altar of the ETS, sacrificed for a political gesture. Whether it is coal, the tourism industry or the agricultural industry, all these issues are being held to account, and Australians are quickly turning their minds to exactly what happens. It is such utter irresponsibility in the middle of a financial crisis to be wandering down this path.

People in Queensland will have to deal with these little tin gods, an army of bureaucrats wandering around the place, assessing what your carbon footprint is and demanding payment—yet another form of this bizarre, socialist trait of going out and interfering in the enterprise of a state. For what? So that they can collect billions and billions of dollars in revenue. The Labor government will use this as a mechanism to dummy up their deficits, to dummy up their debts. The Labor government know they are running out of money and they are going to use this as a mechanism to try and balance the books. They will balance the books with this new tax.

Glenn Sterle (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Sterle interjecting—

Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am amazed at the senator from Western Australia, who should be smarter than that. They should be standing up, but no—the TWU have been silent on it too, haven’t they, Senator Sterle? It is not TWU members who are saying what is going to happen with the emission trading scheme and how it is going to affect their members. No, you sat down quietly too. You are doing the right thing. You are politically correct.

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Joyce, address the chair, please.

Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy President. So it is even the TWU. We have not heard you standing up for the people of Queensland. This is the issue as we go forward with this ridiculous concept in the middle of a financial crisis. This will affect the people of North Queensland, of Mackay. I have said to the people of Mackay: who is standing up for the people of Mackay today? Who is standing up for the coal workers today in Emerald? Who is standing up for the workers in Gladstone today? Who is standing up for the workers of Queensland—the working families—today? It is strange that it is the LNP that is standing up for the working families today. The LNP are standing up for working families today, and that is why, as we go towards this state election, there should be a clear message sent to the voters: are you voting for your job? Are you voting to keep your job or are you going to sacrifice your job at the altar of the ETS, some bizarre concept of no effect, a political gesture? The substance of the science is as peculiar as the white paper itself.

What is the way they can make a statement? Well, the statement is quite clear. If you believe that it is time to turn the pendulum around, if you believe it is time to make a statement of sanity, then make a statement at the ballot box next weekend. Next weekend is the time to send a clear message back to the Prime Minister—as he calls himself, Kevin from Queensland—that we will not be held to ransom—

Alan Ferguson (SA, Deputy-President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! Senator Joyce, refer to the Prime Minister by his proper title, please.

Barnaby Joyce (Queensland, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I retract that—the Prime Minister of Australia, from Queensland. He likes to refer to himself in a partisan way, but he is only too willing to put before the people of Queensland a political gesture to collect certain votes from certain corners at the expense of working Australian families, most specifically those working Australian families from the state of Queensland. So I look forward to the Labor Party actually having some ticker, standing up and bringing some sense back into this debate. Let’s see if they can do it before next weekend and, if they do not, take that as a statement that they have given up on working families. (Time expired)

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

I rise today to comment on this urgency motion and note that it is really an opportunity for senators to make a pitch in the Queensland election. It was not written that way, but we have had a clear example that that is what this is about.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wrote it. Don’t you dare criticise my drafting, Senator Milne!

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

Well, I am very glad that we have an impression of Fred Flintstone from the prehistoric city of Bedrock entering the debate here with a quarry vision. I congratulate Senator Brandis, because he and his cohort around here seem to only be able to look from the base of the quarry out onto the prehistoric city of Bedrock and go on with their climate scepticism. If you want to lose your job in Queensland, plus your livelihood as well, the best way of doing it is to vote for climate sceptics. The best way of losing jobs and livelihoods in Australia today is to vote for the climate sceptics.

Let me just tell you about Queensland, Mr Deputy President, in that regard: 63,000 people earn their livelihoods as a result of the Great Barrier Reef. Those people have real jobs, and they should be sustainable jobs, but they will not be sustainable jobs if we see global warming progress at the rate it is going. If the climate sceptics have their way, we will see bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef occurring much more frequently because of increased temperatures, and soon we will have no tourism industry on the Great Barrier Reef if that continues.

The first point I make is: vote for a climate sceptic if you want to lose your job in the tourism industry and if you want to see one of Australia’s greatest icons disappear. That is why the Greens have always talked about the importance of addressing global warming to protect ecosystems as the base, not only because they are intrinsically worth while because of biodiversity but because of the jobs that they actually nurture.

The second point I make is: if you want to sit in the bottom of the quarry shouting, ‘Yabba dabba doo,’ which is what we have heard here today so far—and here comes Bamm-Bamm to join them—then you are guaranteeing that there will be no jobs, because the reality is that there is an end to the mining boom. And there is rapidly going to come a point where Australian coal sold into overseas markets loses its legitimacy. Just as the tobacco industry lost its legitimacy in terms of the health debate over time, the same thing is going to happen with the coal debate.

For all those people who go on about coal being the backbone of the economy: if you look at the number of jobs involved in the quarry vision, it is nowhere near the number of jobs that are out there in the service industries. The problem with Queensland is that it has had successive governments who have not had a vision beyond the quarry, who can only ever see the narrow base for Queensland in terms of mining, tourism, agriculture and a building boom—and that is it. You need to diversify the economy, to move to the new green economy, to actually rebuild manufacturing in the new economy. If you want to keep manufacturing in Queensland, you have to do it by using renewable energy. The competitive advantage in the world is soon going to be with those countries that can produce large amounts of renewable energy consistently, and that is where large energy users are going to go. All this threat and talk of leakage at the moment is just nonsense. As I demonstrated in estimates only a week or so ago, the issue is not leakage; the issue is profitability. They want in for their cut.

One of the worst aspects of the emissions trading scheme—which is why it is absolutely not the case that the government has not looked after Queensland; I would argue it has looked after them way too well under the emissions trading system—is that it gives up to 90 per cent free permits to the big polluters, who are based in the old sectors. Queensland has done better than most in terms of coal, in getting those free permits under an emissions trading scheme.

Looking at climate change for Queensland, we just heard, ‘What about Mackay?’ from Senator Joyce. Well, what if the recent cyclone had come across the coast there? We would not just be looking at a disaster in an ecological sense; we would be looking at a massive human disaster as well. How could anyone who lives in Queensland stand in this parliament today and talk about not addressing global warming, say that we cannot afford to do it, when that cyclone should have been a big warning that it is only a matter of time before a major cyclone comes much further south than anyone has ever anticipated and crosses the coast? We had the former Premier in Queensland talking about building bunkers up and down the Queensland coast while at the same time building new coal mines. How ridiculous it is for both Labor and the Liberal National Party in Queensland to be talking up new coal mines, coal railways and coal ports on the one hand—while suffering cyclones down the coast and talking about building bunkers—and at the same time be saying, ‘Oh, by the way, we will save your jobs in agriculture,’ when we know the flooding, for example the floods that occurred in Ingham earlier this year, wipes that out.

The fact of the matter is that we have to address global warming. It is true that those in the quarry are starting to understand what global warming is about. It is true that we have always had floods, fires and droughts in Australia, but the climate scientists are telling us that they are going to be more intense and more frequent. So while we have had bleaching events previously on the reef, they have been spread out enough so that the reef recovers over time. We have had floods, of course, and we have had fires and cyclones, but now we have them more frequently and in a more intense way. So you are going to have stronger cyclones and you are going to have them further south than previously. You are going to have disease outbreaks you have not had before, like dengue fever, as a result of changed climatic conditions. So, if you want to lose your job in Queensland, if you want to lose your livelihood in Queensland, and if you want to face life-threatening scenarios on a more frequent basis, then vote for the sceptics. Continue to have the quarry vision; continue to see the state simply as somewhere where you dig holes in the ground and ship it overseas. If you want to do that, you will guarantee Queensland goes further and further backwards. If you want to guarantee a future for Queensland, you look at protecting the highest quality agricultural land for the future for niche markets, you address climate change as rapidly as you can so you do everything you can to protect the Great Barrier Reef and the jobs that are associated with it, you move, as the Greens are doing in Queensland, for World Heritage listing in Cape York to increase the jobs and status and you stop land clearing. Here again we have those in the quarry just putting their noses out long enough to clear the vegetation all around the quarry—250,000 hectares a year are being cleared in Queensland. If you are interested in global warming then you protect native vegetation; you do not knock it down. The Greens are certainly out there saying there must be an end to that level of land clearance.

We have had the government up in Queensland, supported by the Liberal National Party, prepared to put a railway through Shoalwater Bay. So intense is their view of the quarry, they cannot see anything beyond it and were prepared to do that. It was the Greens who stood up for Shoalwater Bay, the Greens who stood up for the refugia in Queensland, where you have over 100 nature refuges at risk from mining. What we have is a political system in Queensland that has never been able to lift its sights beyond the quarry. That is why we have had that nonsense argument put here today that, by addressing global warming, somehow Queensland is being done in. I would argue that by not addressing global warming, Queensland will definitely be done in—Queensland jobs will go. It is about time that people started to recognise that even at this very moment jobs are being lost in those resource based industries because we have hollowed out manufacturing, we have failed to invest in education and training and we have failed to diversify the economy and get into the new green jobs that are the future. That is why Queensland is vulnerable and that is why the old political order that can only see the quarry, which is filled up with the likes of Fred Flintstone and his friends, is the way to the past. If you want to go back to pre-industrial Bedrock—

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Brandis interjecting—

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

then I suggest Senator Brandis is a good one to be driving that old car.

Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We should not be surprised by this urgency motion this afternoon. I am looking forward, in the next couple of weeks and the next couple of months of sittings, to seeing an almost weekly motion, replacing the word ‘Queensland’ with ‘Victoria’, ‘New South Wales’, ‘South Australia’ and ‘Tasmania’, so people have a chance to get up and make a short media grab that will link once again to a fear campaign which refuses absolutely and completely to acknowledge that the issues around climate change and our response to them as a nation are responsibilities that we must take. And it is not just a debate about individual states and the impact of the emissions trading scheme on those states; it is a clear discussion, a debate even, about what our response as a nation will be to the international problems of climate change.

We know that the only reason this particular motion is before us today is that in two weeks time there is going to be a Queensland state election. That was most clear in question time today. Those of us who are Queensland senators must engage in the debate because in fact what we must do as senators who represent Queensland is work with the communities in our state to make them understand that we are working towards a response to an international crisis. Indeed, part of the government’s program is a $2.15 billion Climate Change Action Fund, and the first part of that Climate Change Action Fund is information. It is not just a one-off process; it is about information. It would be really helpful in terms of any debate on climate change if we actually felt that all the senators in this place were effectively engaged in looking at real information about it. It is all too easy to have a simplistic political response, but it is important that we see that responding to the issue of climate change across our world is a responsibility that all of us have. The more we try and deny the issue, the more we try and avoid the issue, the more we try and divide, so that we put individual issues above wider expectations, then the more the globe, our world, will be affected.

It still surprises me that we have to reiterate in this place that climate change is real. It seems to me that some of the spending in the information program should be going to senators and other parliamentarians so that they will make a united effort to look at the problems and then engage across the board on the issues. Climate change is a real fear for all of us. Of course, no-one ignores the threat to jobs, no-one ignores the threat to industry, but what we see as being part of our response, as part of the Climate Change Action Fund, is to look at working with industry and communities to ensure that they see that there are real options.

Senator Milne responded, I think at the beginning of her contribution, to the issues around my wonderful state’s climate and environment. We have heard that there is clear evidence of the horror which awaits places like the Great Barrier Reef if we continue to use the world’s resources and do not respond to the worries of climate change. We know about the numbers of jobs in Queensland which are directly dependent on tourism and the environment. As for how we can move forward to build a new jobs stream for our communities, that is a responsibility on which we must work together. One of the components of the Climate Change Action Fund is to work on developing an industry plan for jobs—to work with existing industries to see how they can change the way they operate to respond more effectively and with less pollution and emissions which harm our planet.

First of all, there has got to be an acceptance that there is a problem. Only then will we be able to work on a response. It is still clear that the opposition have not been able to get their own response to this action together. It is easy to say, ‘What about jobs?’ This is the group that, in the first week of the Queensland election campaign which is happening—and I do not want to dwell on the election process—actually had a Your Rights at Work campaign. I know that taking others’ ideas that have worked is a great compliment. There is a lot of worry about what is happening with climate change, and I think people who deny the necessity of action underestimate the knowledge and understanding of this issue by many Queenslanders, many Australians and many other people across the world. People are worried about our climate and our future, and what we need to do is look at that realistically, not engage in a scare campaign. It is too simple to just scare. It is a simple, one-off media grab.

We need to look at the assistance which the government is putting into place, to see whether we can create jobs and make job transitions in this process. It is not a new thing to look at change in industry, and this is not an unexpected change. In terms of the knowledge that is out there about climate change and what is going to happen, it has been the subject of open discussion and debate in the community for years. Unfortunately, there has only been action on this issue in the last 12 months. If there had been a firmer and more immediate response many years ago to what was happening to our globe, we would not be at the point now where people are confronted by the issue rather than being involved in working on a response. In terms of what we need to do, in parts of my state—and I know it well—there is great reliance on resources, mining and investigation, as well as the coal industry. Those industries have been working with governments to look at their futures. It is not a new issue. What we must have is a COAG process involving all the state governments, the federal government and, I firmly believe, local government as well, because what we need to do is engage with communities at the local level—not just with the large employers but with the people themselves.

We hear figures being thrown around of how many jobs are going to be lost as a result of carbon emissions trading. They are not just the immediate jobs in the mines; they are jobs in the wider communities. We understand that. We cannot talk about individual industries. We need to look at the implications and work with some of the funding from the Climate Change Action Fund. It is not just about a single approach. It must engage with the other levels of government, with community organisations and with NGOs. They all have a role to play. That is integral to the plan that the government have put out. It indicates that we have an expectation that local communities, community groups, individual schools and the wide range of people who work together to form those communities will all have an active engagement in this process, based on knowledge, through the information program, and based on their own sense of responsibility.

Again I say that this is not just about Queensland. This is about each person in our country and across the world. Certainly we need to put into place industry plans that work with the places that are looking at emissions funds processes. We need to work at that level. But people continue to deny the threat. We continue to hear across this parliament different ideas about what exactly the threat is. I have heard recently that Mr Turnbull and Mr Hunt are suggesting that we might even have a higher target than that which has been put before the Senate at this time. We heard today that other people think we should not be rushing into it. It would be useful if we could at least have some common response. When we have that, we will be able to work effectively at building through this process and identifying what our responses should be. We are very much aware that people will have transition issues. No-one denies that. It is not as though we have suddenly come up with an idea and are expecting that no-one will be damaged through the process. We will work with people. That is the core aspect of the government’s proposal before us. But we do not need division. We do not need unnecessary diversion. Certainly, we do not need an issue such as global warming and the environmental threat turned into a simplistic political logo for a state election.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the Minister for Climate Change and Water, who has been in this chamber throughout this debate, disappears without participating in the debate or being prepared to defend the government’s policies—

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

Madam Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. That is really most discourteous, Senator Brandis. You know that arrangements are made between the parties. If you want to debate I will be very happy to debate you anywhere on this issue.

Judith Troeth (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! There is no point of order. Senator Brandis, please continue.

George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was just noting that the minister, although in the chamber, did not spring to defend the government’s policies but left it to her backbench.

On Tuesday, the Leader of the Liberal National Party, Mr Springborg, called for the postponement of the introduction of an emissions trading scheme. In doing so, he echoed the unanimous view of Queensland industry that, whether you support the emissions trading scheme or whether you do not, it is clear to anyone that this is not the right time to be accelerating at breakneck speed towards this dramatic policy with its dramatic economic consequences. The problem is that the Rudd government has decided to proceed blindly down this path because its policies are driven by ideology, not science. Its policies are driven by zealotry, not by intelligence.

That could never be made clearer than by the fact that the moment anybody raises a question about climate change policy they are hissed at by the minister: ‘You are a sceptic!’ I always thought scepticism was a synonym for the application of critical intelligence to a problem. But in the lexicon of the Rudd government it is an insult. Scepticism is the opposite of credulity. Scepticism is the opposite of the willingness to accept policies or proposals which are not evidence based. Yet, in the lexicon of the Rudd government, to apply a critical intelligence to a scientific and public policy issue is the worst thing you can do.

As the person who put down this urgency motion, I make no apology for directing it particularly to the state of Queensland, my own state. Queensland, which is used to being one of those states, along with Western Australia, which lead the prosperity of this country, has been, under the lack of leadership of the Bligh Labor government in recent years, reduced to the very unfamiliar condition of being an economic basket case. Hear what Dr John Black, a former Labor senator for Queensland, had to say in the Australian Financial Review last month. Dr Black said of Queensland:

Regionally, we saw 12-month unemployment growth to January in 40 of our 59 ABS labour force regions. Queensland was the worst affected state and Cairns the worst affected region, with January unemployment—

in Cairns, that is, one of the hearts of the tourism industry—

of 11.8 per cent.

In the unemployment figures that were announced by the ABS this morning we see that Queensland unemployment is now 4.5 per cent. It is still slightly below the national average but accelerating at the same rate as the national average. In the past seven months, unemployment in my state, under the Bligh Labor government, has increased by almost a third, from 3.4 per cent in August 2008 to 4.5 per cent today. That is an increase of 1.1 per cent in only seven months. That is the condition of the Queensland economy today, after nearly 20 years—with the interruption of about two years, in the mid-1990s, of the Borbidge government—under the stewardship of a Labor government.

According to Access Economics, the respected economic consultancy, Queensland is likely to be more affected by the global economic slowdown and by the Rudd recession than any other state in the Commonwealth. Even Mr Andrew Fraser, the state Treasurer, was reported in January warning that the damage done to the state’s two main industries—property and mining—by the global economic situation was very severe. Mr Fraser said:

No part of the state will be spared; no industry will be spared …

When there is a very significant change and a very significant deterioration of the economic circumstances of the state of Queensland—a state whose economy is highly trade exposed, a state whose economy is more dependent than most state economies on industries to which the ETS will apply—is it the time to be rushing headlong, blindly, regardlessly, ideologically, zealously to implement an emissions trading system which has unknowable consequences for the Queensland economy?

Do not take it just from me. Let me give you a sample of some remarks by various key Queensland industry groups. I will start with the beef industry. Queensland is Australia’s biggest beef producer. In fact, it produces 48 per cent of Australia’s beef output. Losses to that sector of the industry as a result of the introduction of the ETS would balloon to $10.9 billion a year by 2030, according to the Australian Farm Institute. Mr Paul Heelan, a grazier from Clermont in Central Queensland, is quoted as saying:

Everyone in the bush is hoping the ETS will go away. We’re at the end of the line. We can’t pass it on but everything will be passed on to us—the cost of electricity, transport, any fodder you’ve got to buy, it’s all likely to rise. The ETS will send some people to the wall. I’m sure a lot of bush people have large debts after floods and droughts. Things are tight enough as they are.

Mr Heelan’s plea to the Commonwealth government is heard throughout the length and breadth of Queensland, as I dare say it is heard throughout the length and breadth of Australia.

The same is the case with the dairy industry. The President of Australian Dairy Farmers, Allan Burgess, said recently:

The Government needs to rethink some of its policy proposals, including the ETS which, as it’s proposed in the white paper, will have a huge impact on the dairy industry and broader food processing sector.

The same plea was made on behalf of the mining industry—one of the great Queensland industries—by Mr Mitch Hooke, the Chief Executive of the Minerals Council of Australia, as recently as Tuesday.

This is a time for intelligence. It is a time for science. It is a time for measured judgment. It is a time to be aware of a material change in the economic circumstances. But the Rudd government and the Queensland Bligh Labor government are blind to the necessities— (Time expired)

Mark Furner (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak in response to Senator Brandis’s tactless motion, which states:

That, in the opinion of the Senate, the following is a matter of urgency:The—

alleged—

failure of the Rudd Labor government to consider the interests of the state of Queensland and, in particular, the Queensland economy in the development of the proposed emissions trading scheme.

As a Queensland senator I am appalled by this motion. This motion is simply a lame coalition scaremongering exercise brought about by the Queensland election. We have a proud slogan in Queensland: ‘Beautiful one day, perfect the next.’ If we had a coalition government in Queensland they would change the slogan to be: ‘Doom one day, worse the next.’

I would like to deal with two aspects of this motion: first, the Queensland economy and, second, the emissions trading scheme. The Queensland economy, just like every other economy, is suffering at the moment not because of the Rudd Labor government and not because of the Bligh Labor government but because of something we all know as the global economic crisis. This is something the Liberal-National Party seems to be in complete denial of. The Rudd Labor government has worked tirelessly to cushion states such as Queensland from the effects of the global economic crisis. We injected firstly $10.4 billion into the economy last year for those struggling the most—pensioners, carers, veterans and families. Senator Brandis, there is no denying it: these payments have worked. Retail sales grew in December and January—and there has been an increase in the housing market—despite the fact that world retail sales have declined.

We then injected a further $42 billion into the economy. This money has affected and will directly affect the Queensland economy. We are providing crucial support to regional Queensland farmers affected by the drought. There is support for families, middle- and low-income earners and students. The household stimulus package will protect Australian jobs. We are building infrastructure to fix Queensland’s national highways and black spots. This injection of funds will see employment levels in Queensland grow.

Nationally, we are building 20,000 new homes and Defence homes. With the ADF having many sites in Queensland this will directly influence the Queensland economy further. Larger infrastructure projects that provide an even longer term boost to our productive capacity will soon be announced by Infrastructure Australia and will keep Australians working well into the future. So we have two massive injections into the economy which will directly affect Queensland, not to mention the fact that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s own seat of Griffith is in Queensland.

I find it hard to believe that the emissions trading scheme has failed the interests of Queensland. There were, if you recall, Senator Brandis, committee hearings in regional and city Queensland, consultation groups, submission requests, newspaper articles, websites, radio advertising and so on which allowed every Queenslander to have a say in the development of the emissions trading scheme. To say that the trading scheme has failed the interests of Queensland is false. In fact, Queensland is strongly focused on. The Minister for Climate Change and Water, Senator the Hon. Penny Wong, visited one of my neighbouring suburbs just a month ago to discuss this very issue.

I remind you we have a crucial say as Queenslanders. We have the Great Barrier Reef, our vulnerable coastline, and World Heritage areas, including the wet tropics rainforests. Queensland is also one of the states with the biggest risk of climate change. We are especially disposed to drought, floods and fires. No doubt people would recall the recent flooding in North Queensland as a prime example of this. I also remind you that the Rudd Labor government has invested millions to support those Queenslanders suffering from these floods. We also have a fast growing population of more than four million people. With Queensland growing at such a fast pace, we cannot afford to not act. We cannot afford to see global sea levels rise, with the potential of massive floods; we cannot afford to double CO2 levels, have the temperature rise and have the health effects of heat related illness; we cannot afford to have industry loss in agriculture, which is valued at $8.8 billion; we cannot afford to have tropical cyclones and further droughts—the list goes on and on.

We have said time and time again that the cost of inaction is too dire. This is evident through the comprehensive report Australia’s low pollution future. Treasury’s modelling demonstrates that early global action is less expensive than later action, that a market based approach allows robust economic growth into the future even as emissions fall and that many of Australia’s industries will maintain or improve their competitiveness under an international agreement to combat climate change. The modelling shows that Australia and the world continue to prosper while making the emission cuts required to reduce the risks of dangerous climate change.

Just last night I was in this chamber delivering an adjournment speech on jobs growth in Queensland, and in the insulation business. I visited a new factory—CSR Bradford—on 19 February. Despite this business operating only from 8 am to 4 pm Monday to Friday since it opened in January, its management is now indicating that the business will quickly be gearing up to employ 70 staff and move to a 24/7 operation. That is where the growth is in Queensland, in the environmental industry. Clearly the component in the $42 billion stimulus package will generate local jobs in the community, enhancing our economy. In fact, in explanation on the subject of jobs, Mr Tannous, the general manager of this business, claimed that the insulation industry’s prediction of 4,000 jobs may have been a serious underestimate. He went on to explain growth in installers, the company’s call centre, sales staff and transport operators as examples of where the jobs growth will occur. It is a real shame Senator Brandis, who is not still in the chamber, does not bother to visit some of the businesses I get invited to and to experience their environmental commitment and contribution to Queensland’s working families.

For the record, this program will allow eligible Australian owner-occupiers to access the insulation and have it installed for free up to a cost of $1,600 from 1 July 2009 until 31 December 2011. Renters will also be able to access this scheme, with landlords being entitled to a rebate of $1,000. Those who wish to install prior to that can seek reimbursement following 1 July. These are all strong initiatives for jobs growth and the economy. The reality is clear: the emissions trading scheme will generate jobs for the future. We on this side are about supporting today’s jobs and building jobs for tomorrow to sustain the economy.

Consistent with what I have seen at CSR Bradford and CSIRO, the Allen Consulting Group found a big shift in the sectors in which employment would grow, arguing that three million people could need additional training as jobs growth slowed in manufacturing but increased in sectors such as construction, transport and services. Senator Wong has indicated the climate change regulatory authority, which would administer the scheme, would need 300 staff. Additionally, accounting and law firms are setting up divisions to service the greenhouse accounting and carbon trading market. A spokesman for PricewaterhouseCoopers said its division already employed 34 people and expected to grow, as reported in the Australian today.

Internationally, governments already going down the path of environmental procedures and policy have emphasised the employment upside to climate change investment. Even US President Barack Obama has promised five million new green jobs. Additionally, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has promised one million new green jobs. But, on the other side, we have people such as Queensland’s own Senator Barnaby Joyce, who has described green fanatics as ‘eco-Nazis’, Senator Cory Bernardi, who claimed human activity had nothing to do with climate change, and Senator Nick Minchin, who denies climate change is man-made.

What is the answer to jobs in Queensland? The Liberal National Party has indicated it would instigate an ‘efficiency dividend’—a cute name for budget cuts—of three per cent across all government departments. This is the hidden agenda only the LNP would be capable of. Maybe that is why the Queensland Public Sector Union has mounted a massive campaign against this lack of job creation. We have already heard from Lawrence Springborg, the LNP leader, of the desire to ‘front end’ and ‘denecessary’ jobs in Queensland. I have been representing workers for more than two decades now and I have never heard of a worker being ‘front ended’ or made ‘denecessary’. Before a Queensland state election—that is what this motion is all about—here we are in this chamber getting from the coalition more scaremongering and fanciful statements about job losses. Most workers would see through this motion of Senator Brandis as the stunt it is.

At a time when we are facing a global economic crisis of mammoth proportions, the Rudd government’s $43 billion Nation Building and Jobs Plan and previous $10.4 billion stimulus package will go a long way towards jobs for our children’s future. Neither this Rudd Labor government nor a Queensland Bligh Labor government will fail working families. This is part of our Labor principle, something a coalition government will never understand. As a Queenslander, I can only say that Labor will keep Queensland strong.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I cannot believe Senator Moore and Senator Furner, both Queenslanders, both from the union movement, can come into this chamber and not stand up for the jobs of working men and women in the Central Queensland coalfields, in the Mount Isa underground mines and in the metals-processing plants in Queensland. I refer particularly to those plants in Townsville and the other zinc metal, copper and nickel production plants in Queensland. Labor politicians and unions come in here and will not speak up for them. I cannot understand why the union movement is not going crazy over this flawed emissions trading scheme. It would be different if this flawed emissions trading scheme were in any way going to impact upon the changing climate of the world, but it will not—and the Labor Party know that. All it will do is export Queensland jobs to other countries with no impact on the changing climate of the world. Let me give you some examples as to why this will happen, Madam Acting Deputy President.

Australia’s biggest competitor in thermal coal exports is Indonesia. Australian coal is going to be slugged with enormous taxes by the Rudd government’s ETS. The Indonesian coal industry will have no taxes. You do not have to be a trade genius to work out that Indonesian coal will become much more acceptable to Australia’s traditional markets of Japan and China, so even if the coalmines in Australia do not shut down they will certainly not expand. They will not be able to continue being uncompetitive as to that competition from Indonesia, so jobs will be lost. In Queensland some 22,000 working families rely on the coal industry for their employment, and they will be out of work in favour of Indonesian workers. Have a look at the copper industry, which is very big in Queensland with copper processing in Townsville and the mines out in the North-West Minerals Province. They will be taxed out of existence. Their South American competitors will not have an ETS so in no way will they be subjected to these additional taxes. So our copper industry will lose out to South America’s.

Take the cement industry. You had the situation in Gladstone whereby Cement Australia was about to spend $800 million on a new cement factory, employing 200 or 300 people in construction and 100, 150 or 200 people in continuing to operate that vastly expanded plant. That has all gone. In Australia cement will become uncompetitive because, under the ETS of the Minister for Climate Change and Water, Senator Wong, cement will have a $20 per tonne tax on it. We are already competing with Indonesian cement in Australia; and Australian cement producers can match it. But when you put a $20 per tonne tax on Australian cement and you can get Indonesian cement at $20 a tonne less, who is going to buy Australian cement? That is why in simple terms this emissions trading scheme is a dog and will cost jobs in Australia.

In my home town of Townsville, Korea Zinc, through Sun Metal, their zinc processors, have said publicly that they will move offshore, so we will not be saving the world’s changing climate and we will be putting Korea Zinc into a country which does not have an ETS. We will be putting all the coal producers, all the copper producers and all the zinc producers into a country which does not have any form of ETS and is not likely to. What we are doing is exporting Australian jobs, and the Australian union movement does not seem to care. I cannot believe that those senators sitting opposite us, supposedly representing the workers, are not marching in the streets to stop this particular problem.

I am pleased to see that Senator Bob Brown is here. Senator Milne led the defence of the Labor Party, as the Greens tend to do over everything the Labor Party do. The Greens were again completely excusing them. That is of interest to me because in the Queensland election the Greens are going to preference Labor in 10 marginal seats. What will this do? It will mean that the Traveston Crossing dam, which I, the LNP and the Greens are totally opposed to, will be built by a re-elected Labor government. Sure, they are not giving preferences in the seats directly involved with the Traveston Crossing dam—well, they are held by the LNP anyhow—but in the marginal seats that will or will not change the government of Queensland the Greens are going out and supporting the Labor Party again.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Bob Brown interjecting—

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Well, you give me a commitment that you will not support them, Senator Brown, but, if you do, Anna Bligh will be returned and she will build the Traveston Crossing dam—and it will be on the heads of the Greens more than anyone else if the Traveston Crossing dam is built. I wait for Senator Brown’s confirmation that they will not be returning Anna Bligh to government by preferencing them in 10 marginal seats.

Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. The senator is verballing me. I asked him why the LNP walked out of negotiations with the Greens—if they had not, there may have been an entirely different preferences result in Queensland.

Judith Troeth (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There is no point of order.

Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It just again shows the Greens are a lackey of the Labor Party. They will preference them in Queensland and it will mean that the Traveston Crossing dam will be built thanks to the Greens political party. Time has escaped me and I can only again plead to those sitting opposite, the supposed saviours of the workers, to join Bill Ludwig—calling Garnaut a wacko, as he did—in calling upon the Rudd government to take a pause to get Senator Wong to have another look at this emissions trading scheme so Queensland jobs will not be put at risk.

Question agreed to.