The recent plastic bag levy trial in Victoria has demonstrated that the draconian measure of forcing supermarkets to charge 10 cents for plastic bags reduces their use by 79 per cent. The difference education campaigns made to plastic bag use had been negligible.
We might ask ourselves whether the Federal Government's proposed carbon pollution reduction scheme can hope for a similar 79 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions. That's hardly likely. In fact it's almost certain that the result will be closer to the negligible end of the scale.
The Victorian trial shows that draconian measures work. If the problem of climate change is as serious as the consensus of scientific opinion would have us believe, we should be looking upon climate change as an emergency, and not merely a serious problem.
That implies that the Government would have emergency powers to force industry to act to significantly curtail carbon dioxide emissions, and to prepare the community for the social and economic consequences. We may have been scornful of China's dictatorial requirement for industry to shut down and for cars to stay off the road, in order to lessen pollution ahead of last year's Olympic Games. But it appeared to work.
Australia's proposed carbon pollution reduction scheme is hampered by its heavy reliance on market mechanisms at a time when there has been a widespread loss of confidence in the market. It creates incentives for business to invest in projects that are carbon-neutral, and avoid those that pollute.
But if business is disinclined to invest in any new projects, which is the case at present, we can expect little or no change to carbon dioxide emissions.
It gets worse than that. Under the scheme, individuals and small businesses might spend tens of thousands of dollars on voluntary initiatives such as solar power. The carbon saving will be passed to the electricity utility, which will then use these emission savings in selling more coal-generated electricitiy to others. The same amount of carbon dioxide will be emitted as before.
It's becoming clear that a business-friendly carbon emissions reduction scheme is an oxymoron. The draconian action which the Government must take to reduce carbon dioxide emissions may penalise particular sectors of the economy (e.g. the coal-based electricity industry). But if we accept that the climate science is right, there is no choice but to endure such a transition to non-emitting industry energy generation.
Emergency powers were used extensively to aid