Warren Entsch (Leichhardt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for the Environment. Will the minister update the House on how the government is reducing emissions without the world's biggest carbon tax? What threats exist to government plans to keep electricity prices down?

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to thank the member for Leichhardt, who not only voted to repeal the carbon tax, along with every member of this side of the House, but also voted for lower electricity prices—from Cairns to Cooktown to Cape York. Do you know what? He did not just vote for lower electricity prices; he delivered them. After the carbon tax was repealed we had the largest decrease in electricity prices in Australian history. More than that, we had decreases in gas prices. We had the impact of the carbon tax taken off fertilisers. We had decreases on a massive scale in refrigerant costs. These were real changes. And, by the way, we took away $5½ billion of giveaways to brown coal producers for no action at all.

He also voted, though, for the introduction of the Emissions Reduction Fund. We recently had the first auction under the Emissions Reduction Fund. Do know what that produced? Forty-seven million tonnes of abatement—four times more abatement in just the first auction than the entire carbon tax experiment. And it did it at a price of $13.95, or about one per cent of the more than $1,300 per tonne of abatement under the carbon tax. More reductions at a massively lower cost without an electricity tax—that is what the member for Leichhardt voted for. In his electorate we also saw the Olkola Aboriginal Corporation put forward a savannah management program. They were successful on a lowest-cost basis, and they are providing 455,000 tonnes of abatement by maintaining savannah land, providing Indigenous ranger jobs, improving biodiversity and providing income for the local community whilst reducing almost half a million tonnes of emissions.

But the Labor Party has not learned the lesson. The member for McMahon visited the National Press Club last week in what can only be called a bravura performance. Whilst he was there he reconfirmed that the carbon tax is back. They will be bringing back the carbon tax at the next election. What does this mean? It means higher electricity prices because, let us be clear, they are voting for higher electricity prices for mums and dads, for small businesses, for pensioners. So the choice will be absolutely crystal clear: real emissions reductions without a carbon tax with tax cuts and lower electricity prices, or higher electricity prices, higher gas prices and higher cost of living under Labor.