A carbon tax could bring 9000 jobs to Bendigo, says ACTU president Ged Kearney.Speaking at a community lecture on the carbon tax at La Trobe University Bendigo yesterday, Ms Kearney said the carbon tax would increase, not decrease, job opportunities in the Bendigo region.The union boss said a study carried out by the ACTU and the Australian Conservation Foundation showed there was a potential for an extra 9000 jobs to be created in Bendigo by 2030.She said the jobs could come out of new industries and cleaner technology if investment started now.“The potential for us is huge, new jobs, less pollution and a cleaner country,” she said.“We really have to spend the time to build up these industries.”Ms Kearney has been travelling around Australia visiting business, factories and community centres talking about the carbon tax and trying to stop the misinformation she says is coming from the opposition and mainstream media.She said the union had made sure of three things before it decided to support the tax – that there would not be undue costs to households; that jobs in the industries exposed would be protected; and that there would be money left over to invest in new industries.“We think a lot of what people have been hearing in the media is not the whole story,” she said.“We thought we’d bypass all that and go straight to the workers.“We’re trying to get the facts to the members so they can get the right information about the carbon tax.”Ms Kearney said she was hoping in turn those people would champion the carbon tax by writing letters to their local newspapers, calling up talkback radio stations and talking to their local members. She also wants union members to talk to friends and family about the benefits of the government’s scheme.“This is really a call to arms,” she said.“There is a lot of confusion.“People actually think it’s going to show up on their Woolies dockets like a tax, but that’s not the case.”However, at yesterday’s lecture Ms Kearney was preaching to the converted, with the large majority of crowd members expressing their support for the carbon tax during question time.