Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Water) Share this | Hansard source

I will briefly respond to Senator Milne. The government is maintaining the commitments in the white paper to fully compensate low-income Australians for the overall cost impact of the scheme and to continue to compensate middle-income Australia. For the Greens to continue to assert that that is not the case is not consistent with the policy that the government is putting forward. The government has put forward a package that we think is both environmentally effective and economically responsible. We do know that the Australian Greens want to remove very substantial amounts of assistance from industry. The government believe that the assistance to industry is important. It is about a responsible start to the scheme. It is about a responsible transition in what we know is a very significant change to our economy.

We do reject the proposition that somehow there is something inappropriate about the package. The single largest share of revenue under this scheme continues to go to Australian households. That is the case. From memory, some 43 per cent of the revenue under the scheme goes back to Australian households. In addition, we also have a fuel tax offset which provides assistance to Australian households. It is not correct for the Greens to suggest that this money has somehow been taken away when the government is ensuring that Australian households continue to receive assistance in accordance with the commitments the Prime Minister made in December of last year.

Question agreed to.