Australia CO2 price to weaken in 2015-16-study | Metals & Mining | Reuters

SINGAPORE Aug 25 (Reuters) - Carbon prices under Australia's planned emissions trading scheme are expected to weaken during the programme's first year from mid-2015 because of an expected fall in international offset prices, a study said on Thursday.

Research by Bloomberg New Energy Finance found that the Australian carbon price was likely to fall from a fixed price of A$25 in 2014-15 to A$16 in 2015-16.

Pouring cold water on a red-hot issue | Daily Telegraph Miranda Devine Blog

The Gillard government is about to lock us into a carbon tax at a cost estimated as high as $130 billion to cut five per cent of Australia’s emissions by 2020. Here is an opportunity to cut 15 per cent of emissions for a comparatively paltry price, without the soaring electricity costs, and yet no one is interested.

Has Australia gone mad?

Police investigation may alter the course of carbon tax and mining tax in Australia - POLITICAL ECONOMY | Mineweb

The implications of this investigation are likely to reach further than just Thomson, however. If the NSW police find there is a case for criminal charges, then a by-election may have to be held for Thomson's seat. And political pundits believe that, given the now low rating of the Labor Government, this marginal seat could well go to the Liberals.

If this were to occur, then there really would be a hung parliament, for the current one seat majority - thanks to three independents and the one Greens member in the Lower House - would be gone and that could stymie the passage of unpopular legislation such as the carbon tax and an increased tax on mining iron ore, magnetite and coal.

While there are many ifs and buts, if the above chain of events comes to pass, the last thing Gillard wants is to call a Lower House election because she would probably be soundly beaten as was Gough Whitlam when his 1970s Government lost the right to govern.