Although Australians overwhelmingly believe climate change exists and it is at least partly a result of human activity, there has been a sharp rise in the percentage of people who do not believe in climate change.

The shift follows the collapse of the UN's climate change conference in Copenhagen in December and widespread publicity of false claims in the UN's 2007 climate change report.

In the week when the Rudd government made its latest attempt to pass an ETS through parliament, public opposition to the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme jumped.

The Prime Minister remains committed to the ETS as a central part of the government's election strategy and continues to attack Coalition opposition to the CPRS.

According to the latest Newspoll survey, taken exclusively for The Australian last weekend, support for the CPRS fell from 67 per cent two months before the Copenhagen summit and before Tony Abbott became Opposition Leader, to 57 per cent.

In October 2008, support for the CPRS was at 72 per cent.

Since Copenhagen and the release of climate change scientists' emails casting doubt on their research and false claims being exposed in the UN's 2007 climate report, opposition to an ETS jumped from 22 to 34 per cent.

Since mid-December, Mr Abbott has been campaigning against the ETS as a "great big new tax on everything", while Mr Rudd has accused the Opposition Leader of believing climate change science is "absolute crap".

Under Mr Abbott's predecessor, Malcolm Turnbull, the Coalition supported the government's ETS.

There has also been a fall in the percentage of people who believe in climate change. In July 2008, 84 per cent of those surveyed believed climate change was happening and only 12 per cent did not believe it existed at all. Last weekend, the number who believed climate change existed had dropped to 73 per cent, down 11 points, and those who did not believe in it rose 10 points to 22 per cent.

Overall there was little change in the percentage of people who believed climate change was either partly or entirely a result of human activity, down from 96 per cent in 2008 to 94 per cent.

However, the percentage of voters who thought humans entirely responsible for climate change was down eight points to 24 per cent, while there was a rise among those who thought humans partly responsible, from 64 to 70 per cent.

Young people were the most strongly convinced of humanity's part in climate change and those most supportive of an ETS to cut greenhouse gas emissions by establishing a carbon market.

Those least convinced of humanity's role in climate change were aged over 50.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/doubt-fuels-opposition-to-cprs/story-e6frgczf-1225830685776