Wong wants to pass ETS before December

7 May 2009, 3:45 pm   -   Source: AAP
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The federal government remains determined to pass its proposed emissions trading scheme through parliament in the winter session, despite opposition from the coalition.

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 The federal government remains determined to pass its proposed emissions trading scheme through parliament in the winter session, despite opposition from the coalition.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong told reporters in Sydney on Thursday it was essential for the legislation to be passed before global talks began at the Copenhagen summit in December.

"We need to ensure we give the right signals to investors and we also need to ensure we go to Copenhagen with a scheme to match our targets," she said.

"We are not delaying the signal to investors. We need that signal so that we drive that investment in the clean technologies and the renewable energies for jobs of the future."

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced on Monday the emissions trading scheme would begin in mid-2011, a year later than originally planned.

But opposition emissions trading spokesman Andrew Robb said on Thursday the government's emission trading scheme needed revising before it could be passed through parliament.

"How stupid would we look if in 10 or 15 or 20 years' time, our major competitors (such as India and China) still have no scheme and we've been imposing these costs (on business) and more all those years?" he said at a National Emissions Trading Summit in Sydney.

"We have to have a scheme with the capacity to play a part in all this but not get too far ahead of the world. "We are worried about the impact that a lot of this scheme will have on balance sheets.

"Some companies in my view are seeing half their profitability on average in the last eight years taken up with the impost that they are going to face."

Ms Wong was unfazed by the comment. "The Liberal Party say they want a global agreement, but they are going soft when it comes to putting on the table legislation that enables us to back our targets to get a global agreement," she said.

"We have always said climate change is a global challenge.

"No one country can tackle climate change on its own. "If you look at the conditions we have put on the 25 per cent target, they are absolutely about ensuring that the agreement that we would sign up to would be a genuinely ambitious agreement that would require contribution across the globe."

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