New Australian prime minister Julia Gillard moved to revive a stalled carbon trading scheme today, pledging more consultation with industry and voters to win support for an issue that has split the country.
Ms Gillard, in her first comments to the media after former prime minister Kevin Rudd stepped down last night, said she believed in climate change, backed renewable energy and that the nation needed a price on carbon emissions. But she also said emissions trading laws would lead to a significant structural shift in the resources-rich nation and they needed to be explained properly to the community.
Mr Rudd quit early this morning before a leadership ballot could be held, leaving his deputy to become Australia’s first female prime minister.
Analysts said Ms Gillard's comments could soothe disgruntled Greens voters who swept Mr Rudd to power in 2007 on the promise of action on climate change but she would need to tread carefully.
"It is as disappointing to me as it is to millions of Australians that we do not have a price on carbon," Ms Gillard told reporters. "And in the future we will need one. But first we need to establish a community consensus for action."
Australia is the world's top coal exporter and among the highest per-capita emitters of planet-warming carbon dioxide, with coal used to generate about 80 per cent of electricity.
Ms Gillard faces a national election within months and climate change will be a major election issue.
Support for Mr Rudd plunged in part because he decided to shelve the scheme in April after failing three times to get Senate support, disillusioning voters who wanted action on climate change.
"If elected as prime minister, I will re-prosecute the case for a carbon price at home and abroad," Ms Gillard said, although any steps to revive emissions trading laws are likely to be in 2011 after the elections expected towards the end of this year.
Her call might also win support from the Greens, who said the stalled emissions trading scheme was flawed and not ambitious enough, while the opposition had labelled it a great big new tax, leading to policy paralysis.
Opinion polls show a recent shift to the Greens party and a spectacular plunge in support for Mr Rudd and the Labor Party.
Mr Rudd had made fighting climate change and a carbon trading scheme, in particular, central to his administration, but was widely seen as unable to properly explain and sell the complex scheme to voters fearful of higher fuel and power prices, while miners expected shrinking profits and losses to overseas rivals.
A dramatic night in Canberra began when it emerged that the Australian Workers’ Union, a key Labor-affiliated union, had withdrawn support for Mr Rudd.
AWU leader Paul Howes said the union had acted because of recent polling which showed that the Liberal-National coalition parties could win the next election, resulting in the conservative Tony Abbott becoming prime minister within months.
"An Abbott prime ministership would be bad for the environment and bad for working people," said Mr Howes. "The union’s position is that we’re supporting her [Julia Gillard’s] leadership. This is pretty unprecedented. The situation we’re in is pretty dire," he said.
Ms Gillard was said to have been angered yesterday by reports that Mr Rudd had got his chief-of-staff to poll MPs on their loyalty to him and whether there were moves to replace him.