“Australia needs more time to ventilate the issues properly and the Australian community needs more time to understand what the ETS means for our Nation and what it means for them individually.

“The ETS is the Employment Termination Scheme for working families in the coal mining and farming belts of Australia. It is undeniable that this scheme will put our major export at risk and also put us on the path to further exacerbate the loss of our food sovereignty. There is no point in saying there is a bright new future in trading credits in the city if the whole premise of your economy has been placed at risk.

“You cannot take the major income earner out of the house then put more impediments on the food in the cupboard and expect the life in the house will go on as before. The mining industry has clearly spelled out this will be a disaster. The farming sector has shown us that this could lead to a 20 per cent reduction in the economy of some regions. The ramifications will flow up every street no matter where you live.

“Presiding over this whole disaster is the undisputed fact that Australia’s scheme will do absolutely nothing to change world global climatic conditions. The ETS is a gesture, it is tokenism, it is a political ploy and it is totally irresponsible.

"Going forward with this scheme in the middle of a recession proves categorically that Mr Rudd has completely lost sight of the economic position that our Nation is currently in.

“The goal for the National Party is to stop the scheme and utilise whatever mechanisms it possibly can to do that. A delay in the vote in the longer term is deemed to be a vote against the scheme. A vote against the ETS is as definitive as a measure as you can possibly deliver in a parliamentary process.”