Greg Hunt seems confidant that they will repeal it.
ABC Lateline last week
"TONY JONES: Greg Combet - you will have heard that Greg Combet said that the Labor Party will not be stepping aside on this and will oppose your repeal of the carbon tax in both houses.
GREG HUNT: Well, I think that whoever is the leader of the Labor Party will take a different decision because if they are defeated, this election will have been a referendum on honesty and on the carbon tax. And if the Labor Party breathtakingly refuses to listen to the Australian people twice in a row, then we will go straight to a double dissolution, seek a mandate for a joint sitting and have the carbon tax repealed within 12 months. With or without them, we will repeal it.
TONY JONES: Yes, I presume you've seen the analysis done by Deutsche Bank which concludes the process of repealing the tax could take eight to 14 months. You've just said 12 months after the election. That is a long time to keep the thing going and to actually keep all the compensation in place, which you'd have to do, wouldn't you?
GREG HUNT: Well we will start on day one the process of repealing the tax. We will do it as quickly as possible. And as I've said, we'll do it within six months. I hope sooner, but I'm being conservative here. We will do it within six months if the Labor Party respects the mandate, respects the will of the people, respects the result of the election and we'll do it within 12 months, and again, I believe we can do it more quickly if they don't. Now in terms of ...
TONY JONES: So, what's - the argument here I suppose is around how long this thing - this carbon price would have been in place, you know, 22 months according to the Deutsche Bank assessments at the minimum. That is a significant omelette to unscramble. How do you explain to business, particularly the power companies who've made investment decisions based on a carbon price, that you're now suddenly going to get rid of it?
GREG HUNT: Well actually there are very few investment decisions that will be made on the basis of a carbon price. This is one of the great myths: that the Government is paying the large brown coal generators to continue producing. These companies will just continue producing. Before the carbon tax, the renewable energy target was 20 per cent. After the carbon tax, the renewable energy target will still be 20 per cent. So there will be no change to generation between now and 2020 in any significant way whatsoever as a result of the carbon tax. In other words, it doesn't even do the job which it was designed to do. It doesn't change generation, it just ends up hurting families."
