We know the story: Kevin Rudd swept to power in 2007 with the promise of an ETS. He decided to negotiate one with the Coalition, finding common cause with his counterpart Malcolm Turnbull, which led to the demise of both men as leaders. Julia Gillard became Prime Minister having buried both the ETs and Kevin Rudd, went to the polls promising not to price carbon. Tony Abbott did worse, he supported the ETS, then in the expediency of his leadership challenge opposed it and buried Malcolm Turnbull. Both went to the polls and the electorate were so disenchanted, it resulted in the hung parliament. So off they went talking to the cross bench independents and the lonce Greens MP who negotiated the carbon price back on to the agenda, - which made Julia Gillard a 'liar' but that was the price of keeping office. Tony Abbott's been running around siding with the loonies and climate change deniers drumming up a fear campaign, while the Greens and independents negotiated with the ALP to get this legislation.
And that's how we got the second-best policy according to Petr Hartcher.
For Gillard, carbon pricing is the reform she didn't want. She proposed the vacuous "citizen's assembly" as a way of killing carbon pricing. She has negotiated this tax not because she believes in it but because it was the price of bringing the Greens and independents together in support of her minority government.
Brown decided to block Rudd's emissions trading scheme in the Senate to hold out for a more ambitious one, then bewailed the government's failure to reform carbon pricing. He is now supporting Gillard's second-best scheme in an effort to salvage something from nothing.
And Abbott once urged the opposition to support the Rudd scheme in the interests of expediency, and then, as leader, opposed it in the same cause.
Even so, industry leaders thought he should have negotiated the terms of the carbon tax with Gillard. This would have reduced the power of the Greens and made it more business friendly. Instead, he pursued his populist oppositionism and left Gillard to deal with the Greens.
And there's the crux of the biscuit for the industrial lobbies that opposed the carbon tax along with Tony Abbott this time through. In a game of double or nothing, they doubled down on the side of not having any kind of policy on carbon in this country but badly misread the prevailing winds. If Julia Gillard's only reason for being PM was that she negotiated *something* with the independents and Greens, then they should have been awake to the probability that this time, the thing was going through. The greater irony is of course is that had the last one gone through, it might have been a bit better for the industry lobbies.They really misread the public mood, which has resulted in this legislation.
The funny thing is that this was on the cards ever since the hung Parliament election last year and when Julia Gillard announced she would price carbon as a result of her deals. It's amazing such a poliy got through in a hung Parliament, but maybe sometimes that is what it takes to get change.
Phil Coorey writes the Greens had to compromise greatly too.
The Greens complained last time abut the lack of restrictions on polluters to stop them buying permits overseas, enabling them to keep polluting at home. This scheme has restrictions but they do little more than pay lip service to the concern.
The CPRS was to start with a fixed price of $10 for a year before turning into an emissions trading scheme with an estimated starting price of $26. This scheme will start as a fixed price of $23, indexed upwards for three years, and has a floor. The government claims it will be a net lower carbon price over the first three years.
Today, the already febrile nature of federal politics will increase to that of an election campaign, with Gillard and Abbott locked in a fight to the death. The Greens and the government can ill-afford to bicker.
Either way, the Greens' policy purity of two years ago has gone. Like Labor, the minor party could not afford to fail to reach a deal this time. It's called compromise.
Welcome to political reality.
It seems in the final wash up, the Greens didn't come close to getting everything they wanted, and that perhaps this is a good thing for industrial Australia. After the last time through, it raised serious questions as to what on earth the Greens were doing in parliament if they couldn't get some kind of carbon trading scheme up and running. So it seems this round of negotiations was indeed a last ditch effort to salvage something from a real political opportunity with their names carved in to it. It was do or die for the Greens as much as the ALP.
Why Are You In Politics, Tony?
Which brings me to Mr. Abbott, who made a laughable speech after the Prime Minister made her speech. He said taxation was bad. I laughed out loud because if taxation per se was bad, then the Liberal Governments he was part of did a lot of bad things - like introduce the GST. There is no way taxation in of itself is 'bad' - it depends on the tax policy and this why policies get debated (like, d'uh Tony). So it seems it's quite appropriate to point out that had Mr.Abbott done some negotiating instead of fear-mongering in the public arena, they might have gotten something that better suited their perceived constituency of big business.
I guess he decided it was better to play the political game than to wrestle policy - which he already seems to choose every time - but just this once it seems he missed an opportunity to do something worthwhile and participate in a historic decision. Instead he's going to go down as the clown who went jumping around playing politics in the polls while an important legislation worked through Parliament with nary an input from his party.
The polls might suggest he's way ahead of Julia Gillard right now, but once this thing goes through, he's going to look weak and powerless for not being able to stop it. All this talk of repealing it is not going to help his cause at the next election when the pricing will already be in place. So really, what the hell are you doing in politics, Mr. Abbott?
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