THE Nationals have again defied Opposition leader, Malcolm Turnbull, in voting with the Greens in a failed bid to overturn tax breaks for new carbon sinks. The move has exacerbated coalition tensions and foreshadows a split on emissions trading later this year.
The Nationals and the Greens used routine tax legislation to attempt to overturn the tax breaks introduced last year, backed by both Labor and the Liberals, The Australian Financial Review reports today.
Mr Turnbull strongly supports upfront tax deductions on the cost of planting carbon sinks and argued for them when he was environment minister in the Howard government and within the Opposition last year.
Nationals Senate leader, Barnaby Joyce, said the party felt strongly about the issue and wanted to put its views on the record again, even though it had no real hope of overturning the tax breaks.
"There is no point in carbon sinks legislation taking out of production prime agricultural land," he told the Senate.
Email a friend