House debates
Thursday, 29 October 2009
Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Australian Climate Change Regulatory Authority Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (Charges — Customs) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (Charges — Excise) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (Charges — General) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS Fuel Credits) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS Fuel Credits) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Excise Tariff Amendment (Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Customs Tariff Amendment (Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme) Bill 2009 [No. 2]; Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme Amendment (Household Assistance) Bill 2009 [No. 2]
Second Reading
4:53 pm
Damian Hale (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source
That was when the Libs were in power, but I will not go through who was the chair and who was on that committee. They had a second inquiry. The report was called Between a rock and a hard place: the science of geo-sequestration. That was tabled on 13 August 2007, just prior to the election. Then there was Sustainability for survival: creating a climate for change, tabled on 7 September 2007. The fourth one was Sustainable cities, a report on the inquiry into sustainable cities, tabled on 12 September 2005. Then there was Australia’s uranium—greenhouse friendly fuel for an energy hungry world. That was a ripper. I do not have a date for that one—they might have just put it in the bottom drawer! The next one is The heat is on: Australia’s greenhouse future, tabled on 7 November 2000, nearly nine years ago. The seventh report was on the Kyoto Protocol Ratification Bill 2003 [No. 2]. As we know, that was never ratified by the former government. That was tabled on 25 March 2004. The eighth report was on the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Bill 2007—a fantastic inquiry—and was tabled on 6 September 2007. Then there was the report of the inquiry into the energy white paper, tabled on 16 May 2005. The final one was the joint committee’s Report 38: the Kyoto protocol—discussion paper, tabled on 4 April 2001.
The opposition come into this place with their scaremongering campaigns on climate change, wanting the Australian public to believe that this has crept up on them just now under Labor, since 24 November 2007: ‘Suddenly Labor have decided to put climate change on the agenda. They’re going to have these ghastly taxes and everything’s going to go up in price, and Labor haven’t given us any time to prepare for it.’ Well, there are heap of different reports that have come through this parliament. One of the real challenges for the parliament is that we have the reports and the research—the parliamentarians have standing committees, go to all these meetings and take in evidence—but we then need a conduit that takes that to where the policy is formulated. All these reports are an absolute waste of time unless we actually react to what they are saying.
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