Australian carbon laws vote delayed till May |
http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKSGE61N02M20100224
Australia's troubled plan for a multi-billion dollar carbon trade scheme hit a new delay on Wednesday when parliament's upper house, the Senate, postponed debate on the package of 11 bills until at least May.
The step intensifies the political stalemate over an issue championed by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd but which has damaged his government's credibility and could hurt his Labor Party's standing in elections due later this year.
Rudd's carbon trade plans were already rejected twice in 2009, handing the prime minister the legal option of calling an early election on climate policy, although he has repeatedly played down the option.
A delay in the vote till May further cuts the chances of him calling an early poll on climate.
"In Australia, support for the carbon pollution reduction scheme is dropping by the day. There is absolutely no rush at all," independent Senator Steve Fielding, who strongly opposes the CPRS scheme, told parliament.
The delay came as Australia's peak manufacturing body expressed concern about the uncertainty surrounding climate policy, and said the chances of Australia adopting an emissions trading scheme in the near term was now remote.
"Given the fracturing of the domestic consensus on climate change policy and the failure of international negotiations, there is great uncertainty around how to progress this issue and no clear way forward," Ai Group chief executive Heather Ridout said in a statement.
The laws, returned a third time to the Senate on Monday, face near certain defeat when a final vote is taken. The government is seven votes short of a majority in the Senate and would need support from five Greens and two independents to pass the laws.
The Senate on Wednesday rejected a government push to allow debate to proceed on the carbon trade bills in the current parliamentary session, which ends on March 18.
The move means the laws will not be decided until the budget session of parliament, which starts on budget day on May 11.
Public support for Rudd's carbon trade scheme has weakened after the global climate conference in Copenhagen failed to seal a tougher legally binding deal to fight global warming. [ID:nSGE61602N]
The scheme, due to start on July 1, 2011, would force 1,000 of Australia's biggest polluting companies to buy permits for every tonne of carbon they emit.
The carbon-trade plan is the central plank of Rudd's promise to cut greenhouse gas emissions, blamed for global warming, by at least five percent of 2000 levels by 2020. (Reporting by James Grubel; Editing by Rob Taylor and David Fogarty)
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