CARBON EXTRA: Australian Government leaves room for shift on caps

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The Rudd government has been accused of using “doublespeak” in the draft carbon reduction pollution scheme (CPRS) bill, possibly to give it “wriggle room” on setting Australia’s GHG emissions caps.

Dr Andrew McIntosh from the Australian National University’s climate law and policy centre told Carbon Extra a stand-out change in the draft bills from the CPRS white paper was its wording on the govt’s promised five-year gateway emissions caps to take Australia from a 5% reduction in GHG emissions in 2010 to a 15% reduction by 2020 (on 2000 levels).

The five-year ‘gateways’ emissions caps were designed to provide business with certainty on the caps well in advance.

Section 13 of the main draft CPRS bill says from July 1, 2015, or later, “the national scheme cap must fall within the upper and lower bound of the national scheme gateway (if any) declared by the regulations”.

However, s14 - “the operative provision, the one that counts”, McIntosh said - of the draft bill says “the minister must take all reasonable steps to ensure” the caps are set five years in advance.

“Now, ‘all reasonable steps’ does not equate to a statutory obligation to fall within a gateway,” McIntosh said.

“So the government’s given itself some wriggle room. Who knows if they’re going to use that to raise the cap or lower the cap? But the wording suggests the government’s commitment to making sure the caps fall within a gateway is all of sudden a lot more wobbly.”

McIntosh described “this double speak” as “outrageous” given the government’s promise to provide business with certainty.