Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) president Sharan Burrow emailed thousands of people with a plea to back the federal Labor government's flawed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS).
An October 23 email to the Your Rights at Work email list called on unionists to pressure MPs and senators to pass the climate bill when it is presented to parliament for the second time in November. Coalition, Greens and independent senators rejected it in August.
A union campaign to support the CPRS is needed because a "small group of dinosaurs in parliament are planning to vote against climate change laws", the email said.
However, Burrow's "dinosaurs" include Greens parliamentarians, who will vote against the CPRS because it would set pitifully weak emission cuts targets, ignore the climate science, hand out billions of dollars to the big polluters and allow Australia's emissions to rise.
Greens Senator Christine Milne told the National Press Club on June 17: "Rejecting the CPRS gives us hope that real solutions could be implemented … bringing down emissions far faster and cheaper."
Most peak environment bodies also oppose the CPRS. The more than 150 climate action groups present at January's national Climate Summit said they would campaign "to prevent the CPRS from becoming law".
Burrow said her email was on behalf of the Union Climate Connector Team. The Union Climate Connectors is a joint initiative of the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF), the ACTU and nine unions.
It was launched in August to provide training and resources for union activists who want to take action on climate change. Its website does not specify support for the CPRS.
On October 12, ACF campaigns director Denise Boyd said the Greens' proposed amendments to the CPRS bill were "exactly [the] kind of improvements we need if we want Australia's emissions trading scheme to be environmentally effective".
However, Boyd also said the ACF's support for the CPRS would continue unless the bill was further weakened.
Burrow's email said the CPRS would "help Australia cut greenhouse gasses and create up to a million jobs".
Yet the Australian Institute's Richard Denniss said government claims about the CPRS were "spin", in an October 6 article on Crikey.com.au.
"The Treasury modelling of the CPRS tells you all you really need to know about the CPRS", Denniss wrote. "First, Australia's domestic emissions will be no lower in 2019 than they were in 2008. Second, the carbon price will be so low that no coal-fired power stations will be forced to close down. Third, all of the 'reduction' in emissions will come from importing permits from other counties."