Peter Martin in his blog yesterday pointed out a flaw in the proposed national emissions trading scheme which makes many uneasy.
This monumental elephant turned up in Australia's living room because the Rudd Government is like it's predecessor in many respects - it also appears to think that Australia is solely big business and industry.
When in fact the major polluters are frequently multinationals operating under multiple flags, to whom no-one owes a living least of all the Australian citizen, voter and taxpayer.
This column is about the coal-fired power industry, but it could have been about the asbestos industry, or the tobacco industry.
Never once on the countless occasions that Australian governments have restricted the sale of tobacco have they felt compelled to compensate the manufacturers for ''significant reductions in their profitability''.
Why would they? The cigarette manufacturers knew what was coming (and had decided to invest anyway) and were blessed with rusted-on customers.
But there was another more important reason why our governments didn't offer ''compensation'' to the industry they were trying to cripple.
To do it would have been to accept that the existing tobacco manufacturers had continuing ''rights'' that the government had to buy out in order to proceed.
It would have helped create a precedent that would have undermined the right of Australia's parliaments to act as they saw fit.
It would have undermined our sovereignty as voters...
The Government's independent climate change adviser, Ross Garnaut, saw the danger clearly in his interim report delivered earlier this year.
As he put it, ''There is no tradition in Australia for compensating capital for losses associated with economic reforms.''
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