Labor MPs quiet as regional jobs exported
Warren Truss
Queensland’s Labor MPs are refusing to stand up for their own constituents despite new evidence that the proposed emissions trading scheme will cost thousands of jobs in their electorates.
The Leader of The Nationals and Shadow Minister for Transport, Warren Truss, said James Bidgood (Seat of Dawson), Chris Trevor (Flynn), Kirsten Livermore (Capricornia) and Jim Turnour (Leichhardt) needed to speak up in Canberra but had been deathly silent.
The Australian Coal Association today launched a major advertising campaign to explain what those Labor MPs are refusing to accept – that mines will close and jobs lost if the proposed ETS is introduced.
The executive director of the Australian Coal Association, Ralph Hillman, said today that Labor’s new tax on everything “will potentially make some Queensland mines uneconomic and will prevent others from opening leading to thousands of jobs disappearing in the nation’s coal industry”.
“What more evidence do these Labor MPs need to convince them that the city-centric ETS proposed by 100 percent city-based Labor ministers will severely damage their local communities,” Mr Truss asked today.
“Everyone wants a cleaner environment. Everyone wants to reduce emissions. But why would we introduce a new tax on everything that will cost the coal industry alone $14 billion over 10 years?
“The industry believes 9000 jobs will go as 16 mines close prematurely. Why are the men and women who are meant to represent those workers in Canberra silent on this issue?
“These jobs will simply end up in other parts of the world, thereby producing more global emissions and probably making the environment worse,” Mr Truss said.
