More trouble for the carbon credit scheme that Labour wants to use to fund climate initiatives, and National wants to use to pay for tax cuts. 

The government has now tried —and failed— for a third time to auction off credits which would give businesses the right to emit carbon dioxide. 

That means the Government is short of almost a billion dollars it expected to have, as it heads into next Tuesday's Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Update. 

ANZ Agricultural Economist Susan Kilsby told Mike Hosking that the credits will be up for grabs again at the fourth auction in December. 

She says the more times the units fail to sell, the harder it could be to sell them. 

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• Govt. carbon credit auction fails a third time