David Johnston (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the opposition I confirm that we are supportive of the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Amendment Bill 2009, in line with the very learned and erudite speech given by the shadow minister and member for Flinders, Mr Hunt. The point we should make is that a matter of moments before this bill was introduced into the House there were substantial amendments put to it. Clearly, the bill received very limited consultation time from the department and the minister. We have before us at some later time today or this week an explanatory memorandum that has been rewritten, rewritten, re-amended and re-amended again. So we are on our fourth version of some 19 pages.

This is terribly indicative of the parlous state of timeliness, consideration and, generally, the due diligence that has been applied by the government, and particularly this minister, to this most important area. Without a proper national greenhouse energy reporting framework there can be no enforcement. This is the fundamental issue that is underlining an emissions trading scheme. Without proper legislation that is well thought out, we cannot have an emissions trading scheme. There are 12 pages of amendments due to come into this place from the government. What does that say about the government’s preparation of the bill?

I have indicated that there are some, I think, 32 areas that have been substantially amended. As I say, it is important legislation. The legislation has been brought forward with a limited degree of consultation. It is an enormously important piece of legislation that will evolve to provide government with a clear perspective and a register that sets out what is happening in those companies that are beyond the threshold, their reporting and auditing.

The opposition supports this bill. It sees it as an important bill but simply is perplexed as to why the government could not have got it more correct from the outset. What is the great hurry here? I find that is the most perplexing aspect of the government’s performance in its due diligence here. As I say, we have an explanatory memorandum, a supplementary explanatory memorandum, a correction to the explanatory memorandum and a revised explanatory memorandum. I am wondering what the fifth version could possibly be entitled. That is a mystery to me which I am hopeful we will never have resolved. On behalf of the opposition I confirm that we support the bill.

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

I rise today to say that the Australian Greens also support National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Amendment Bill 2009 and recognise that it is an amendment to a framework for reporting greenhouse gas emissions. Clearly that is needed. There needs to be a rigorous process for actually auditing the greenhouse gas emissions, and obviously compliance comes with that. However, there are a couple of issues which remain outstanding as far as the Australian Greens are concerned, and I have circulated a couple of amendments to this legislation. They are similar to the issues that I raised when this bill was first introduced into the Senate, and I want to foreshadow that I will be moving these amendments in the committee stage when we get to that part of the bill.

The amendments that I intend to move to this legislation go to two particular matters. The first one is facility-level reporting rather than reporting the totals of a corporation. This goes to this issue of transparency, public information and corporate accountability. It is the view of the Australian Greens that you should be reporting at the facility level so that, for example, a community can find out the specific emissions from a certain power station—a certain point source—and not just be able to find out that a corporate group across Australia, which may operate half a dozen facilities, has an emissions level of X. The community should be able to come down to look at which of the operations are the biggest polluters across a corporation or a particular corporate group. That is the first one. We need to go beyond just reporting the whole of a corporation—the total. We need to have the total but we need to be able to break that down into individual facility-level reporting. I would be interested to know why the government continues to hold out and say that that is not necessary. I presume that the argument will be that it is commercial information and therefore is validly confidential.

I would argue that the community has a right to know where our largest point source emitters are in order to be able to get greater accountability from a company. Some of the numbers are going to be quite substantial across corporations and you are not going to be able to have a sense of where the changes are being made and where the pressure needs to come on, particularly in terms of putting pressure on to increase the efficiency and to look at the level of subsidies and compensation and so on that is going to go to those corporations that have individual facilities amongst a whole lot that are particularly big greenhouse gas emitters. That is the point in terms of facility reporting.

The second issue is the threshold of the level at which you might report. Of course, there are lots of different ideas about where you would establish the particular level. The government has gone to 25,000 tonnes. The Greens believe that we should reduce that to 10,000 and I would note that in the European Union reporting framework all emissions above one kilotonne must be rigorously accounted for in terms of liable entities under the emissions trading scheme. So I would like the government to indicate whether they would be prepared to take the threshold down to 10,000 as opposed to 25,000 tonnes. I think that that would be in line with best practice and where we will be going in the future. If not accepting that now, we should at least be agreeing to the phasing in of it. Our amendment relates to a phase-in period. But in principle there are two issues: one is facility-level reporting as opposed to totality across a corporation and the other is in terms of the threshold at which you would be required to report.

In foreshadowing those amendments that will be coming later in the committee stage, basically, the Greens are going to support the amendments the government has brought in to tighten up some of the aspects of the audit requirements. I do think that it is important that the auditors be registered and that there is an appeal process in relation to that. I think those moves will improve the general assessment that will go on in terms of greenhouse gas monitoring under this legislation.

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

I thank senators for their brief contributions to this debate. The National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Amendment Bill 2009 makes amendments to the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007. From memory, that was in fact legislation that was prepared by Mr Turnbull in his then position as minister for the environment under the previous government, which might answer Senator Johnston’s question as to why the amendments were not thought about previously. He might want to ask his leader.

The act commenced in September 2007 and established a framework for mandatory reporting of greenhouse gas emissions, energy production and energy consumption by industry. It is an important part of our strategy to combat climate change in an economically responsible way. It is legislation that will underpin the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme and assist the government to ensure Australia meets its international reporting obligations and it facilitates the reduction of duplicate industry reporting requirements under existing state, territory and Commonwealth programs. Senators would be aware that corporations which exceed certain thresholds are required to register and report greenhouse gas emissions and energy data. The first reporting period under the act was the financial year 2008-09.

The bill confirms and demonstrates the government’s continued commitment to an efficient and effective national greenhouse and energy reporting system, including a robust audit framework. The amendments in the bill also support the establishment of the CPRS with a staged approach to ensure a smooth transition for business and other affected parties. The bill reflects extensive stakeholder consultation on the audit framework to be established under the act and around the reporting arrangements in the lead-up to the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme.

The bill requires individuals who conduct greenhouse and energy audits under the act to register with the regulator, the Greenhouse and Energy Data Officer, to ensure the quality of the auditing process. Stakeholders support a registration process for auditors and through these amendments the government is delivering the necessary framework for a robust auditor registration system. The bill also enables the minister to determine by legislative instrument the requirements for the preparation, conduct and reporting of audits. This is to ensure greater levels of consistency in the conduct of audits and the reports provided by auditors. The amendments also clarify that the legislative instrument may outline different types of greenhouse and energy audits. This will provide the regulator with flexibility to target audits towards specific outcomes.

The other amendments contained in the bill protect commercially sensitive information. This is an issue to which Senator Milne referred and I am sure it will be part of the discussion during the committee stage. It is the government’s view that reporting entities do need confidence that commercially sensitive data will be protected.

Accountability is also an important component of a world-class reporting system. The bill allows for review by the AAT of any decision by the regulator to refuse to register an auditor. This ensures that statutory decision making is transparent and defensible. The regulations will take these review rights further by ensuring that all decisions by the regulator that affect registered auditors are reviewable. The amendments also give the regulator the power to publish certain audit results. Currently, the regulator has no power to disclose to the public information on the outcomes of audits. This amendment has been put forward in response to stakeholder feedback that audit outcomes are a key indicator of the reliability of a corporation’s published greenhouse and energy information. The bill also removes the obligation for the regulator to publish energy production information that is aggregated in such a way as to be unusable or potentially misleading. The proposed amendments will address potential confusion between economy-wide energy production statistics, such as those produced by ABARE, and corporate-level energy production totals. I want to emphasise that this will not affect the reporting obligations of corporations registered for reporting under the act and neither will it affect publication of corporate-level emissions and energy consumption data. Collection of energy production data will remain a key component of the act to inform government on energy flows across the economy and to underpin energy statistics publications.

Finally, the bill also includes amendments in recognition of feedback from industry seeking increased flexibility in establishing reporting arrangements under the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting system from the first reporting year of 2008-09. To achieve this flexibility the bill includes the reporting transfer certificate concept, which allows the voluntary transfer of reporting responsibility from a controlling corporation where one member of its group has operational control of a facility to a member of a different corporate group that has financial control of that facility. These amendments promote consistency between the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting system’s reporting regime and the future Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, thereby ensuring a high degree of continuity between current and future reporting arrangements. The provisions are to commence on the day after royal assent and will be voluntary. They will reduce administrative and economic costs on industry and impose no additional burden on industry, beyond those originally intended by the act.

I want to emphasise that this bill is the result of continued, comprehensive stakeholder consultation, on both the act and the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. Given Senator Johnston’s contribution, I remind him, for example, that the introduction of the reporting transfer certificate concept in the bill was in recognition of feedback from industry, which sought increased flexibility in establishing reporting arrangements under the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting system from the reporting year. These provisions that introduce the reporting transfer certificate concept are voluntary. And the alignment of this concept with the liability transfer certificate concept outlined in the CPRS, as I said, also ensures a high degree of continuity between current and future reporting requirements.

I again remind the chamber that this bill has been the subject of comprehensive stakeholder consultation, including numerous discussion papers seeking stakeholder feedback, workshops and one-on-one discussion with key affected parties. Given that Senator Johnston has chosen to assert otherwise, I would like to again put the facts on the table. For example, the department released a consultation paper and conducted workshops on the audit framework in October-November last year. Three hundred audit professionals and reporting entities around Australia participated in those workshops. A consultation paper on amending energy production disclosure requirements unde the act was also released for public comment over three weeks at the beginning of this year, and stakeholder submissions were received on that consultation paper. In addition, an exposure draft of the bill was released for public comment in February 2009. Various submissions were received from industry and from the public. I also note that the government introduced some amendments, in part as a result of these consultations, in the House. Contrary to what I understand the opposition mistakenly understood, there are no government amendments before the Senate.

The amendments to the act included in this bill will make the audit framework for the act and the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme more robust and support this government’s commitment to economy-wide accountability for greenhouse gas emissions, energy production and energy consumption. I commend the bill to the chamber.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.