Opposition misses point on carbon compo: Climate Institute

The federal opposition is “missing the point” about a carbon tax compensation package, the Climate Institute says.

Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey has claimed the multi-billion dollar scheme, announced by Federal Climate Change Minister Greg Combet on Wednesday, won’t change consumer behaviour.

But Climate Institute chief executive John Connor said the opposition was “missing the point” of the scheme, which was about making large carbon emitting industries take responsibility for their pollution.

“It’s about changing investment and power generation decisions which has consequences that are passed down the chain to households,” he told reporters.

Mr Connor welcomed the household compensation package, which will be funded from more than half the revenue raised by the tax.

“What’s important for people to understand is that by finally making big polluters start to pay for their pollution, we get them to make decisions and investments in cleaning up their act, but we also get a pool of revenue which can support low income and some middle income households,” Mr Connor said.

Mr Combet claims the compensation package would leave millions of households better off.

But Mr Hockey questioned why the tax was being introduced if households weren’t forced to change their behaviour, saying the tax and the compensation scheme would just redistribute wealth.

“If a lot of people are better off, what’s the purpose of the tax?” he asked.