Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, post some extensive second reading speeches—you'd think there was a capacity for these things to be considered in a good-faith discussion around this. And yes, we are opposed to what this bill establishes and sets out to do, because it is a new tax.

This bill is not going to deliver the environmental outcomes that the government claims it will. It's going to make things worse, because we are part of a thing called the world. When you tax businesses out of existence here in Australia, do you know what they're going to do?

I think Senator Rice might benefit from a bit of education here, because the thing is that if it's more expensive to do business here, like manufacture cement or aluminium or engage in native forestry in this place, you're going to do it somewhere else, in those jurisdictions, those countries, that do not care about the impact on the environment. It's called offshoring.

It counts when it comes to emissions as well, as Senator Cadell says. By tidying up our own backyard and forcing some of these businesses offshore—because I don't believe there are assurances to keep these businesses here and minimise their impact on the environment and work with those businesses to do so—not only are we offshoring the emissions but we're also offshoring their jobs and the economic value to the community.

So, again, huge changes were proposed in these last-minute amendments, part of a dodgy deal between this one group of people. They go by different names—Labor, Green—but they're one team. They always are and always will be. That's the kind of thing they do. They team up to shut down the economy and pick on regional Australia. But yes, more detail around those time lines would be very helpful, because we all know this is leading to one thing, and that is economic Armageddon.