The Courier-Mail
By: Michael Madigan, Adam Gartrell, Susanna Dunkerley.
Additional reporting: AAP
About 1000 of the nation's biggest polluters will be required to buy permits under the Federal Government's emissions trading scheme.
The Government on Wednesday will release a Green Paper on an ETS, which is likely to include a proposed model.
Climate Change Minister Penny Wong, pictured, yesterday said the Government estimated about 1000 Australian businesses would be required to take part in the scheme.
"The Government puts a limit on how much carbon pollution is permitted, we issue permits up to that limit for companies, and it is each of those permits which creates a price, therefore an incentive to reduce pollution,'' Senator Wong told ABC Television.
"We anticipate approximately . . . 1000 Australian companies will be required to take permits under this scheme. "Obviously, we will focus primarily on the large polluters.''
Opposition climate change spokesman Greg Hunt accused Senator Wong of misleading the public by trying to make it appear as if only 1000 companies would be affected by an ETS. "This is a tax on everyone and everything,'' Mr Hunt said.
Senator Wong said the Opposition's policy position on climate change was still unclear.
Following a week of confusion, Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson yesterday agreed to support a scheme but said he wanted Australia to put more pressure on the world's largest polluters to follow suit.
Senator Wong said the Government was conscious of the rest of the world but was committed to a 2010 start-up. "This country has a very clear economic interest in a strong global agreement,'' she said. "We have to push very strongly the international agreement, and we also have to implement an effective domestic policy.''
Meanwhile, a new report released yesterday by the Make Poverty History coalition recommends Australia's immigration intake include a quota for climate change refugees. The group's co-chair James Ensor said climate change was contributing to large-scale movements of people.