Its enemies therefore are mostly cynics who question its efficacy rather than people fearing immediate material loss if it becomes operational. And second, because, as a non-market state-funded subsidy to large polluters, it represents a net "spend" by government. This means it can largely be legislated as an "appropriation bill" within the budget and thus will likely be waved through an otherwise hostile Senate by the Labor opposition. Clive Palmer has other ideas. The mercurial Queenslander has zero confidence in "direct action's" carbon abatement potential and doubts the Coalition's bona fides anyway on climate change. Palmer declared the policy "hopeless" and "gone" on Monday, sparking fresh concerns over its future in the 76-member Senate post June 30.

Assuming no backing from the Labor-Green alliance, the Coalition will generally need either all of the 5 independents plus PUP, or PUP and at least three of the five independents in the new Senate to pass bills. Yet on the question of "direct action" per se, these calculations may be moot. This is because the government is preparing to move its key direct action legislation as a budget bill. The long-standing convention is that opposition parties do not block the government of the day from appropriating money even where the numbers exist in the Senate (1975 is the exception that proves this rule). An enraged Palmer smells a rat.

In response, he has flagged withdrawing his support for repeals of the mining and carbon taxes if "direct action" is not extracted and debated separately from the budget. Keeping those taxes would seem unlikely so expect the government to call his bluff if it comes to it. More likely is that the ALP simply waves through the emissions reduction fund at the heart of "direct action", thus rendering objections from the Greens and PUP irrelevant. Whether the entirety of "direct action's" machinery is able to be legislated this way remains unknown, raising the prospect of a cut down version, denuded of its baseline setting functions for carbon emissions, and compromising its capacity to meet the already too modest 5 per cent target. The real pity is that a genuine direct action scheme currently exists. The $10 billion Clean Energy Finance Corporation, which Abbott had derided as "Bob Brown's bank" during the Labor years, actually constitutes a working model of direct action in operation.

Abbott has promised to dump it, and is showing no signs of wavering despite the fact that the CEFC finances innovative clean energy projects, and can be said to be delivering real carbon abatement. Loading Unlike the proposed scheme, it runs on a commercial basis and returns hundreds of millions in dividends to the commonwealth. Follow us on Twitter