Garrett left out of Rudd's 'gang' on ETS backflip

ENVIRONMENT minister Peter Garrett has extraordinarily revealed he first learnt of the government's decision to ditch the ETS in a newspaper.

Environment Minister has revealed he was not consulted on the government's plan to ditch the emissions trading scheme and learnt of the decision in a newspaper.

ENVIRONMENT minister Peter Garrett has admitted he was not consulted about the government's decision to ditch its proposed emissions trading scheme and that he knew nothing about it until he read it in the newspapers.

Mr Garrett said the decision was taken by Kevin Rudd's inner Cabinet as part of the budget process and he had taken no part in the discussions. He said it was disappointing that the decision had been leaked and revealed that the first he knew about it was when he read a story in a newspaper report on April 27.

"That was an announcement and a decision that was leaked and I found out about it when it was leaked," Mr Garrett told Sky News' Saturday Agenda.

Mr Garrett's admission is confirmation that the ETS decision was not discussed by the full cabinet and that the discussion was restricted to the so-called gang of four: Prime Minster Mr Rudd, his deputy Julia Gillard, Treasurer Wayne Swan and Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner.

It also confirms that the ETS proposal was abandoned as part of the Budget process. Factoring in the ETS costs would have made it harder for the government to meet its accelerated target for eliminating the budget deficit.

Reports today have suggested Mr Tanner was a voice of dissent when discussing the idea, but the other three senior figures carried the day.

When questioned about his exclusion from the decision making process, Mr Garrett said it was disappointing that the decision had been leaked before the government had completed its internal discussions.

"It's always disappointing when you get information that makes its way through into a newspaper and that the processes of discussion that otherwise would happen aren't able to happen, but it's a decision that was taken.

"And I guess my response to that is that the special budget committee is the one that makes these decisions. I don't sit on that budget committee. And at the end of the day, once the government had determined that this was the way it wanted to approach the CPRS, and it had a very good reason for doing so.

"The thing about it is that the decision was made and this is what you respond to when decisions are made. You understand the reason for the decision and you get on with doing your job. And obviously if you get an opportunity to participate strongly in discussions, and those opportunities obviously arise in a range of areas, you take them.

"But at the end of the day the responsibility for taking that decision lay with that group.

"We do have exhaustive discussions in the Cabinet and I get every opportunity to participate as is appropriate."

Mr Garrett blamed opposition in the Senate for the decision to postpone further consideration of an emissions trading scheme until 2013 at the earliest.

"The fact that we didn't have any bipartisan consensus on moving forward on this issue means that to take the legislative actions that underlie the CPRS, you're at that sort of end game point.

"The conviction that the party, including Kevin has, about climate change, is an enduring conviction."

Mr Garrett's admission is further evidence that major decisions in the Rudd government are made by the so-called "gang of four" and are not considered or reviewed by a wider circle of ministers before they are announced.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott jumped on the revelation, saying it shows the government is being run by the "gang of four".

"It show the decisions are taken by a 'gang of four' without any real consultation with anyone," he told reporters in Sydney today.

Small business minister Craig Emerson told ABC Lateline on May 13 that he did not know the government was proposing to introduce a resource rent tax on mining until the news was broken by The Weekend Australian in April.

Mr Abbott said the Rudd government was looking as chaotic as its NSW Labor counterpart, which yesterday suffered two ministerial resignations in one day.

Responding to a new poll in Queensland showing the federal coalition with a lead over Labor in the state, on a two party preferred basis, Mr Abbott said he maintained it would still be difficult to beat a first term government.

He dodged questions about whether, as the latest polls seem to indicate, voters leaving federal Labor are adding support to the Greens, saying simply that Mr Rudd had suffered a major fall in support.

Additional reporting AAP.