HOUSEHOLD ASSISTANCE UNDER THREAT WITH CARBON TAX CHANGES WARNS NEW MINISTER

Labor’s household assistance could be cut as part of Kevin Rudd’s proposed changes to the Carbon Tax.

New Climate Change Minister Mark Butler confirmed just last Friday that any change would have a financial impact on the Budget requiring a reassessment:

Fran Kelly:
Under discussion I guess is the big hole that would knock into any government’s budget because $24 a tonne is the price on carbon in this current phase. If you switch to an ETS you drop to the world price which the EU has at round $6 a tonne at the moment, that’s a lot of money to forgo, billions of dollars.

Mark Butler:
Well that’s right. I mean there are a great number of implications for a decision like this and obviously if the Prime Minister wants to have a discussion about that we would need a whole range of pieces of information on the impact on revenue, the impact on household assistance and the like.” (ABC Radio National, 28 June 2013)

This follows the warning from his predecessor, Greg Combet, that moving to a floating price ahead of the three year fixed period:

“it’s not an easy thing to do because setting up an emissions trading scheme is quite a complex thing and that is one of the reasons why we put in place a fixed price period for three years” (Channel Ten, Meet the Press).

The change could have a $15 billion dollar impact on the Government’s revenue over the forward estimates based on the current EU price.

But no matter what Kevin Rudd is planning, the Carbon Tax went up today from $23 to $24.15 and is budgeted to keep going up to $38 by 2019/2020. If Labor is re-elected the cost to Australian families and business will increase putting pressure on the cost of living and Australian jobs.

The sooner the Prime Minister sets an election date and allows the Australian people to decide the issue, the better.
The Hon Greg Hunt MP Member for Flinders Shadow Minister for Climate Action, Environment and Heritage