Alex Gallacher (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

and won the election on it. I do not know if voters have ever actually voted for a tax, so I do not suppose that the dropping of 'carbon' from in front of 'tax' would have made much difference, but the reality is the scientists are all saying that there is an issue. They are staking their reputations on it. Labor put up a couple of institutions, the CCA and the CFC, which would provide independent, rational advice—the government did not have to abide by the advice, it just had to be responded to—and ensuring that they had independence in what we are telling voters. And when you do go down the reinsurance side of climate change—the money men and women, those people who run these vast global conglomerates underwriting insurance re climate change and national disaster—there is no dispute there. You do not get any dispute there. Swiss Re says climate change and the management of those efficiencies arising from it is 'in their DNA'. They say that they underwrite 722 organisations representing $77 trillion worth of assets.

This issue has been distorted for short-term political gain. It has been disparaging to a vast number of conscientious scientists, and ignores the DNA of the Liberal Party to look where the money is. The money is saying that climate change is real, that natural disasters cost lots of money. And what nation should not take responsible action, including taking responsible, independent advice from the CCA, to mitigate the effects of that not only on the Australian population but on the Australian economy? It defies common sense that this government take a low-ball strategy to win an election and ignore the national imperatives of climate change and the effect on the economy. If they go their way—and I have had a look at their policy—they will be paying polluters not to pollute. Forget all the other arguments. All economists will tell you a price is what changes behaviour—a price on speeding stops people speeding and a price on pollution will stop people polluting—not paying people to pollute a little bit more slowly, which is what appears to be the guts of the Abbott government's policy on climate change.

I would like to simply restate that they need to have a good look at their policy, look at where the financial institutions of the world, in terms of reinsurance—

Debate interrupted.