Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Kennedy for his question because he has an intense interest in the future of all of those commodities which are particularly concentrated in the north-west. For that reason I was pleased to visit there some three or four months ago and to meet with all of the industries from the region. I was very pleased to do so with the Queensland Treasurer and, in particular, to discuss with locals the implications of the Sims report, what that means in terms of the supply of power to that region, whether or not there would be a transmission line and how that was being handled by the framework put in place by the Queensland government. I also think it was very productive that, at the roundtable convened only about a month ago here in Canberra with my colleague Minister Ferguson and also the member for Kennedy, the member for Leichhardt and the member for Dawson, we had a very important discussion about the renewable energy resources in that region and how they might be further developed and, in particular, about the importance of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme and the RET that we have put in place to drive investment in that region, most particularly investment in renewable energy.

As the member for Kennedy knows, the process in terms of the future of the supply of power to the region, and whether it is a transmission line that comes from Townsville or it is generated locally, is very much part of a private sector process that the Queensland government is engaged in at the moment. I will certainly be encouraging my Queensland colleagues to facilitate that as quickly as possible, because an enormous amount of investment hangs off the decision that is taken in that process. But there is no doubt that putting in place the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, if it is passed by this House, will be one very important concrete step to facilitate the processes that flow from that, including extracting maximum value from our renewable energy target. So we must get that piece of legislation through the House.

There is an enormous potential in this region. This government, committed to working with the Queensland government, does hold very dear the objectives that he has outlined in his question today. The federal government and the Queensland government will continue to do everything we possibly can to put in place the framework to secure the objectives that the member for Kennedy has at the very core of his question. But the one thing that we need here is the passage of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme through the House to provide the stability and the certainty to essential investment in this very important sector, which goes to the core of our national prosperity and the core of prosperity in so many of our great regions of this country.

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