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THE Australian election campaign has become a carbon-neutral zone with neither of the major parties committing to introduce a carbon tax or emissions trading scheme in the three-year term of the Parliament to be elected on 21 August.

While both the Labor government and the coalition opposition are promising to reduce the nation’s CO₂ emissions by 5% compared to 2000 levels by 2020, they have backed away from putting a price on carbon.

Under her predecessor, Kevin Rudd, PM Julia Gillard’s Labor Party introduced legislation for an emissions trading scheme which was rejected twice by the combined votes of the Coalition and Greens in the senate.

In a major campaign speech delivered in Brisbane, Gillard announced that a Labor government would appoint a 150-member Citizens’ Assembly to “examine the evidence on climate change, the case for action and a market based approach to reducing pollution”.

“A Gillard Labor Government will build community support for action on climate change through a 12-month process that directly involves this representative group of ordinary Australians,” she said.
“Their role will be to provide an indicator to the nation of the progress of community consensus.”

The assembly would be informed by a new a Climate Change Commission which would be required to explain the science of climate change and report on progress in international action.

The Coalition led by Tony Abbott has already promised a “direct action” approach to meeting the 2020 target. Central to the policy is the establishment of an Emissions Reduction Fund to provide incentives for industry to reduce CO2 emissions by 140m t annually over the decade.

The Labor Party’s climate change policy also includes a move to impose “new best practice coal emissions standards” on any new coal-fired power stations which would also be required to be carbon capture and storage ready.