Australia Scraps Its Pollution Tax Thursday July 17,2014

After days of debate and stalling tactics, the Senate on Thursday July 17,2014 voted 39 to 32 to unwind the carbon pricing scheme introduced by Labor in 2012.Introduced in July 2012, it charges the 348 highest polluters A$23 (£13; $22.60) for every tonne of greenhouse gases they produce.

Tony Abbott,the Australian prime minister has delivered on his key election promise to abolish the carbon tax following a fight he has pursued like a zealot since seizing the Liberal leadership from Malcolm Turnbull in December 2009  

It had to adopt as it own, amendments proposed and changed three times by the Palmer United Party after the Senate last week voted down the repeal bills a second time

This time, as promised by Clive Palmer, his three senators and PUP ally Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party's Ricky Muir gave the government four of the six votes it required to pass the repeal package.

Family First's Bob Day and Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm - also on the crossbench - rounded out the majority needed.

Independent senator Nick Xenophon and DLP senator John Madigan also backed the repeal.

Labor and the Australian Greens opposed the legislation as expected but fell far short of the numbers needed to defeat it as they did in March

John Connor, CEO of The Climate Institute think tank, commented, “Today’s repeal of laws that price and limit carbon pollution is an historic act of irresponsibility and recklessness. “With the senate’s vote today, Australia not only lurches to the back of the pack of countries taking action on climate, but sees the responsibility of emission reductions shift from major polluters to the taxpayer.
“Today we lose a credible framework of limiting pollution that was a firm foundation for a fair dinkum Australian contribution to global climate efforts.”

Australia has one of the highest per-capita greenhouse gas emission rates in the world