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July 5, 2012
Companies have already started started to make misleading price claims about the impact of the carbon price. The impact of the carbon tax on small businesses will be modest--around $4 or $5 a week for a very small business.
The Australian Trade and Industry Alliance is an anti-carbon tax group that has claimed that the price of electricity would rise 20 per cent immediately and up to 400 per cent by 2019 because of the carbon price. The group is made up of the Minerals Council of Australia, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Australian Coal Association, the Australian Retailers Association, the Housing Industry Association and Manufacturing Australia.
They have been part of the sustained campaign of fear and disinformation around climate change and the carbon pricing that has resulted in the whole field of climate policy in Australia becoming so polarised.
What is going to happen is that the dirtiest fossil fuel power generating capacity in Australia will be closed down by 2020. The plants under consideration are Hazelwood, Yallourn and Energy Brix in Victoria, Playford B in South Australia and Collinsville in Queensland.
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This report below is from a month ago.
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/accc-rejects-claim-of-25-power-bill-rise-from-carbon-tax-20120611-20659.html
"SMALL businesses around the country were warned yesterday by the opposition [Greg Hunt] they could be facing carbon tax-related increases in their power bills of an alarming 25 per cent....
But the ACCC chairman, Rod Sims, said he could not see any circumstances where an average small business could have a carbon-related price increase of ''anything like 25 per cent''"