PrintAugust 13, 2009
Australian Senate defeats cap and trade legislation
Sanity wins Down Under. The warmist fantasy embraced by Labour Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had led to what Reuters correspondent Rob Taylor earlier called a "day of reckoning." The BBC reports:
The Australian parliament has rejected government plans to introduce an ambitious carbon trading scheme to tackle global warming.
The measure was the centrepiece of the government's environment plans, and would have cut greenhouse gas emissions by 5% over the next 10 years.
But opposition senators who control the upper house feared the legislation would harm the country's mining sector.
Rudd, who needs support from seven senators outside the government to pass laws through the upper house, can resubmit the bill after making amendments. A second rejection after a three-month span would give him a trigger to call an election."We may lose this fight, but this issue will not go away," Climate Change Minister Penny Wong told the Senate in Canberra. "Australia cannot afford for climate change to be unfinished business."
But warmism opponents welcome a full debate. Australian Senator Steve Fielding writes some interesting common sense:
Australia is really yet to have the debate about what is driving climate change.For years I believed, like most of us, that man made carbon dioxide emissions were the main cause of global warming.
However, over the last few months after speaking to a number of scientists both here and overseas I have discovered the science on both sides of the debate isn't conclusive.The government needs to explain to the Australian people why global temperatures have remained steady over the last 10-15 years despite skyrocketing man made carbon emissions.Given this question remains unanswered, I believe Australia should wait until the climate change conference in Copenhagen at the end of the year, before we pass any emissions trading legislation so we can see what the big economies and polluters around the globe plan to do to tackle climate change.
I believe this is the best course forward for the country as moving before the Copenhagen conference will put unnecessary pressure on our economy with massive job losses and sky rocketing electricity prices.In June of this year after my return from a self funded trip to Washington, I put three questions to the Climate Change Minister Penny Wong and Australia's Chief Scientist asking them to explain the Rudd government's belief that man made carbon dioxide emissions are the main drivers of climate change. Click on the following links for more information on:
Hat tip: Ray Baney
