The Bus Industry Confederation is among a group of three transport advocacy groups supporting the call on carbon pricing
April 14, 2011
The Australasian Railway Association (ARA), International Association for Public Transport (UITP) and Bus Industry Confederation (BIC) are backing calls by leading Australian companies supporting the introduction of a carbon price.
BIC Executive Director Michael Apps says BIC’s support for a carbon price is conditional on revenues being reinvested to support improved public transport services.
“In the transport context, we need to encourage alternatives to fuel guzzling cars, the biggest transport sector,” Apps says.
“This could be achieved by incentivising the use of public transport, walking and cycling options.”
The group issued a joint statement this week saying that transport currently accounts for more than 40 percent of households’ total energy use.
The statement says that as demand for freight and passenger movements continue to grow each year, so too will transport emissions and the need for greater investment in infrastructure to meet this demand.
UITP Australia and New Zealand Executive Director Peter Moore says on a per capita basis Australia is one of the highest emitters of CO2.
“We really need to improve this performance and a carbon price is a key step in the right direction,” Moore says.
According to the International Energy Agency, Australia’s transport system is one of the least energy efficient systems in the developed world.
ARA CEO Bryan Nye urges Australians to realise that introducing a fair system of carbon pricing will be most beneficial to households.
“Not introducing a carbon price will leave taxpayers with the bill, where taxpayers subsidise big polluters for their pollution,” he says.
“Every dollar from the carbon pricing system must go back into the economy and this will go towards ensuring that households and industries receive support during the transition to a low carbon economy.”
Nye says the Federal Government can fund the required infrastructure to ensure a sustainable future.
He says revenue raised through a carbon price mechanism can be used to fund required transport infrastructure investments, which will assist in meeting the growing passenger and freight transport demands.
“Some business and industry associations have come out strongly against any move towards a carbon price,” says Nye.
He says this is not the view shared by a significant proportion of the business community.
“This doesn’t reflect the spectrum of views from our 160 plus member companies, nor the views of the wider business community that we have discussed the introduction of a carbon price with,” Nye says.