Gavin Marshall (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The committee is considering the Clean Energy Legislation (Carbon Tax Repeal) Bill 2013 and related bills. The question is that amendments (1) to (3) on sheet 7443, moved by Senator Collins, be agreed to.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senators might recall from the other evening when we were in committee the list of questions that were asked of the parliamentary secretary on the government's plans for direct action. They went unanswered and indeed they remain unanswered and, in particular, the Senate committee dealing with that issue has yet to report to the Senate.

So we are no wiser on the government's plans to address climate change. We are no clearer on how the government's plans will address climate change. There are a couple of things in Senator Birmingham's earlier contributions, though, that I would like to briefly address. However, the committee consideration at this stage, hopefully, will not need to continue in much further detail.

Senator Birmingham, apart from providing relatively entertaining clips on a range of issues, such as my slinking around the chamber—I do not know what he had been doing that evening, but, hopefully, he is in a slightly better mood this afternoon—referred to the lie of our position. The evidence he gave us of one aspect of the lie of our position was that—

Senator Cormann interjecting—

Perhaps, when one smiles insults, it is meant to have a different meaning, Senator Cormann. But, unfortunately, Hansard does not record smiles. Anyway, back to the point: Senator Birmingham claimed that, as evidence of the lie of our position, we had not introduced legislation. He failed to mention, of course, that an exposure draft had been circulated and was the basis of consultation. Indeed, we heard the other day in relation to Direct Action that that is exactly what the government are planning to do in their case as well. So much for the lie of our position.

However, I would like to address the questions raised by Senator Milne regarding Labor's cap on carbon pollution. Senator Milne was keen to know exactly what the cap on carbon pollution was going to be on 1 July 2014. In fact, as I recall it, Senator Birmingham also raised that we were not really serious because we had not specified exactly what the cap would be. So let me deal with this issue in some detail.

Senator Milne was also keen to know exactly what the opposition was going to do about the Climate Change Authority report, which recommended—just to remind the chamber—that Australia increase its five per cent target to 15 per cent. Let me start with the issue of the legislative cap on carbon pollution. The answer is quite simple and it is laid out in part 2, section 14 of the Clean Energy Act 2011. Labor invested a great deal of time and energy in planning for a clean energy future—in fact, more time and energy than any other government in Australia's history.

The carbon pollution cap is held in regulations, and in making those regulations the minister must have regard for the following: Australia's international obligations; information provided by the Climate Change Authority under section 292; and Climate Change Authority advice on carbon pollution caps and carbon budgets. In addition to that, the minister must have regard to a range of other matters, including global, economic and social matters; compliance with this act; and domestic and international targets and estimates. The regulation giving effect to the carbon pollution cap for 2015 under current law in this country is to be tabled under section 38 of the Legislative Instruments Act 2003 by 31 May this year.

I am quite confident that the dedicated people in the Department of the Environment will have continued the good work of the climate change department in considering the elements as laid out in Labor's legislation that go to making the determination about what the right level of cap would be for the first year of an emissions trading scheme—unless Senator Birmingham wants to advise us differently!

The fundamental point here is that Labor has done the hard yards on this. Labor has a process and a series of legislative conditions and considerations that frame the setting of the cap on carbon pollution. Those conditions and considerations allow for all information available to be taken into the decision, including the latest advice of the Climate Change Authority. So, if Senator Milne would like to see a cap on carbon pollution, she will need to vote for Labor's amendments.

Then, as Australia falls behind the rest of the world in taking action on climate change, as we see more and more damage to our precious environment, where will we be? What exactly will the Greens party be achieving if they do not support these amendments for our children and our grandchildren? Voting with us on these amendments is the only way of ensuring a cap on pollution.

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

I have rarely heard a more disingenuous contribution than the one we have just heard from Senator Collins. I guess I should correct that by saying that the Palmer United Party's backflip on the renewable energy target was probably equally disingenuous in saying in Western Australia on one day that they supported the current target and then, on the very next day, having the leader of the party, Mr Palmer, come out and say that he does not support a mandatory renewable energy target, which means he does not support one at all, because a voluntary one is a meaningless concept. That was a pretty disingenuous set of statements from them.

I just want to go through this to make very, very clear here that, as one of the people who was in the room working on developing the legislation with the former government, of course I am familiar with part 2 section 14. 2011 is the date. What is set out in part 2 section 14 is the process you go through to set a cap. I know what that process is. Everybody knows what that process is. The question I asked was: what is the cap? The whole point of the process is that you go to flexible pricing with a cap. That is the point.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

31 May.

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

Labor still has not said what the cap is.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Cabinet Secretary) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

31 May.

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

I want to go through it again with Senator Collins so she can understand it. If you are to go to this flexible pricing on 1 July this year, you must have legislated a cap. It must be put in by regulation. 31 May is indeed the date by which Senator Collins and the Labor Party amendment say the regulations are to be put in. My point is this: what regulation are you putting in? If you are putting up a thing which says, 'We want to go to flexible pricing on 1 July this year,' then you are obliged to tell people what cap you are putting in that legislation. Otherwise, the assumption is that it is the default five per cent. You could make no other assessment because the legislation is written such that if another cap is not put in by the government of the day then automatically the cap is set at a default of five per cent.

All we have heard from the Labor Party is that there is a process and the department will do it. No, the department will not do it. Labor's amendment is basically saying, 'The government has to put in the cap.' We know that this is a nonsense amendment anyway because the government is not going to do it. But, if Labor were the government, what would the cap be and what would the regulation be that sets that cap? It is not in here. Basically Labor have been hoist on their own petard. This whole thing has come about because former Prime Minister Gillard went on television and conceded that carbon pricing, in her view, was a tax. That is where she went wrong. She should never have said that because it is not a tax; it is an emissions trading scheme. But once she said it she was stuck with it and it allowed the 'great big new tax' lie of the Abbott opposition at that time to take effect.

Then, in order to overcome the political fix that they got themselves into, Labor went to the election saying, 'We will get rid of the tax.' We have never had a tax. We have an emissions trading scheme and it is the law. Contrary to what Senator Collins is saying, the Greens want to uphold the law, not put up some pretence that by voting for this amendment you would somehow get something. You would not. You would not get anything because Labor are not the government. They are not going to do it. But what we have at the moment is the law—that is, we will be going to flexible pricing on 1 July next year unless the current law is repealed. I am going to do absolutely everything in my power to make sure it is not repealed.

But this nonsense that we are going through now, this pretence from the Labor Party, is just that. When the legislation was written, the point was that Labor and the Greens could not agree on the cap. We set up the Climate Change Authority. They were to report in February 2014 to recommend to the government of the day what the cap should be. They have made their recommendation. It is 15 plus four per cent—that is, 19 per cent—by 2020 and a 40 per cent to 60 per cent reduction trajectory by 2030. That is what they have recommended. My question to Labor which still has not been answered is: do they accept the Climate Change Authority's recommendation that that should be the cap? Yes or no? Clearly, they do not. So all this subterfuge that is going on is basically saying, 'We want to go through the pretence that we can do something, and we are going to have a five per cent default cap.' The Climate Change Authority has reported, as it was designed to. It reported in February for the government of the day to accept or otherwise the recommendations. If no cap is put in, the flexible pricing starts on 1 July 2015 with a five per cent default cap. That is the way it is written and legislated so that there cannot be a period where there is no cap. You cannot have a flexible pricing scheme without a cap.

Therein lies the complete mess that Labor have got themselves into. When the election campaign promise was made by the Prime Minister of the day, Kevin Rudd, to get rid of the carbon price, he did not expect that these amendments would be being debated after the Climate Change Authority had recommended its target. Now that it has, Labor cannot escape and hide behind an election promise of last year. The key question people want to know the answer to is: if we were go to flexible pricing on 1 July this year, what would be the cap? That is clearly not being answered. It shows why these amendments are fanciful. What we have now is the law, and I most certainly do not want to see the law repealed in order to have this fantasy view being put up by the opposition which has zero chance of passing. Why would you trade a law that is in place for a fantasy that will not come to any kind of fruition and is disingenuous anyway because they are refusing to name the cap? That is why the Greens will not be supporting Labor's amendments here. It is because they are not genuine amendments. They have no chance of being implemented in law. That is why we need to retain the law as is.

Secondly, Labor have already voted with the coalition to get rid of the auctions leading up to the flexible pricing phase in 2015 on the basis that they would bring in the regulations that would support these amendments. But they are not the government. There will be no bringing in of these regulations by anybody, because the coalition have said they have no intention of doing it. So we have this ridiculous situation where we have no capacity to deliver the auctions that are required by 2015 under the law—and we will have to reinstate those when we succeed in retaining the carbon price, in spite of what the government of the day might say.

Question negatived.

Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question now is that schedules 2, 3, 4 and 5 stand as printed.

Question agreed to.

Bills—by leave—taken together and as a whole.

Bills agreed to.

Bills reported without amendments; report adopted.