Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Finance and Deregulation) Share this | Hansard source

There is an environmental benefit to a scheme which reduces Australia's emissions. There is an economic benefit in ensuring that you have the widest appropriate scope to that scheme, because that reduces the economic cost. The proposition from which we commence is that there is a benefit to reducing Australia's emissions. That is a proposition you share, Senator, because if that really were your position then why would you do direct action? If that really were your position you would not do direct action. You would not pick winners with taxpayers' money to reduce Australia's emissions. If that is your position you should go in to your party room and say to Mr Abbott, 'We should not have a direct action policy to reduce Australia's emissions by five per cent.'

You also talked about costs of production as being the primary factor of competitiveness in a global industry. There is some truth to that, Senator. But I would say this to you: I bet you would not come into this chamber and say that we should pay Chinese wages to coal workers. I bet you would not say that. You would not come into this chamber and say that we should pay Indian wages to coal workers in your state. So let us not pretend that this country has always decided, in relation to a globally traded commodity, that we should equalise the costs of production across the globe. We would never accept that. I do not think anybody in this chamber would accept that—not even Work Choices went that far.

Because the Senator is proceeding again on the proposition that somehow this will cause dreadful damage to the coal industry, I would remind him of two points. The Treasury modelling of a carbon price indicates that coal output will continue to grow strongly over the coming decades with or without a carbon price, doubling in size by 2050. Coal industry employment has more than doubled in the last six years. I am advised that there is an investment pipeline of $70 billion in the coal sector; I have actually seen higher figures than that. There are some 87 new mines either under construction or awaiting approval. The vast majority of the coalmining industry is not emissions intensive, and we have provided a very substantial amount of assistance, both for abatement technology and more generally to the industry, to reflect that proportion of the industry which is very emissions intensive.