I am a bit confused with the costing Abbott's Fund-a-mental plan. Is it a $1 billion fund (as per the SMH)  or is it a $2.5 billion fund (as per The Australian)?

Getting down to the nitty gritty of Abbott's plan, the Greens have issued a statement on Abbott (and the governments) plan. Senator Milne says:

"Both Mr Rudd and Mr Abbott have studiously avoided making polluters pay, avoided the tremendous potential of protecting Australia's forest carbon stores and avoided the reality of what climate science demands."

She points out that this is just a recycled Howard plan:

"This is a 'tried and failed' approach, based on John Howard's Greenhouse Gas Abatement Program, which was slammed by the Auditor General but loved by polluters looking for greenwash. It failed because it paid polluters to do what they were going to do anyway."

Charles said over at Political Duo-ble, that researchers have "hypothesised that conservative politicians are more reluctant to act on climate change because of their fixation with free market ideology". Rudd's plan may not be the best, but at least it had a carrot-and-stick approach to reducing emissions.

A lurker commented to me today that Abbott's plan relies on "big business doing the right thing".

And that ain't gonna happen. If they can continue to make big profits at the expense of the planet, then they will.

Abbott's fund is just mental.