Page 5251 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 18 November 2009
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work about exactly what those targets should be, and we should have regard to the national and international context in doing that. There is nothing wrong with that; in fact, it is a reasonable and considered approach.
What I do have a problem with, when turning to Mr Seselja’s amendment, is that we have this position from the opposition which criticises what the opposition believe is a failure in terms of target setting. But we then have a position from the Leader of the Opposition that refuses to commit to any target whatsoever. If you turn to his additional comments, as he was of course a member of the committee inquiry into greenhouse gas reduction targets, he refused to endorse any target at this time. He described the setting of targets at this time as pre-emptive. He went on to say that pending the results of Copenhagen and the finalisation of a CPRS it would be pre-emptive on the part of the committee to agree to a target now. I am frustrated by this position because we have the Liberal Party criticising the government for setting targets but we have the leader of the Liberal Party in his additional comments in the committee inquiry saying, “It is pre-emptive to agree to any targets now.” I think the Liberal Party need to get their story straight on what they believe the position should be in relation to targets. On my way of viewing it, it is a case of having it both ways and a real case of sitting on the fence.
I agree with the comments of Mr Rattenbury about the process that we got to in this debate today. The government has sought to engage constructively with the Greens on how this motion can be put together, and I am grateful for the dialogue that Mr Rattenbury and I have had through our offices on achieving what I think is a good and strong way forward that sets out a position that this Assembly can agree to. The government therefore will not be supporting the approach that has been adopted by Mr Seselja in his amendment.
At 6.00 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.
MR CORBELL: The other point I wish to make about the Liberal Party’s position is that, yes, you can certainly say that the policy and the thinking behind the greenhouse strategy that they released in the early 90s was well based in terms of the science and the understanding of the issue. But did they fund programs to deliver the reductions? Did they put in place budget proposals to drive down emissions? No, they did not. So they had a good policy, but they did not fund it, they did not resource it and they did not deliver the results that they committed themselves to.
Let us look at what has been happening to date as part of this agenda. The most significant greenhouse gas reduction measure we currently have for the territory is the greenhouse gas reduction scheme, the GGAS, in which we are a partner with New South Wales. That scheme, put in place by the Labor government in 2005, has avoided 1,600,000 tonnes of emissions since its inception in 2005. In 2008 alone, the scheme achieved 679,000 tonnes of emission abatement—a practical on-the-ground measure, independently audited, that works in reducing emissions; an important initiative put in place by this government.
Of course the feed-in tariff, a tariff championed by my former colleague Mick Gentleman, endorsed by this Labor government and now being investigated for
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