Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Science and economics are problematic bedfellows. Any attempt to shoehorn progress and expedite new technologies invariably leads to disappointment. The nature of scientific progress is not linear, nor can it be controlled or predicted. If the venture is not economic, then it is not sustainable. How ironic that Labor members seek to sustain an unsustainable idea and an unsustainable industry. When one introduces constraints by means of a renewable energy target, there are unintended consequences. It is known that the marketplace of ideas, like the marketplace of goods and capital, works best unfettered. Introducing artificial constraints that are demonstrably uneconomic perverts the efficient allocation of both human capital and financial capital. The ones left paying the price for Labor's nice ideas are the people of Australia. The RET will punish poor people disproportionately more than the wealthy. Labor has dropped caring for the poor and the working class for champagne socialism. Unrealistic divestments of time and capital and artificial crises punish those that can least afford to be punished. The RET has and will continue to cost jobs and push the cost of living much higher for many millions of Australian families.

What is known of Labor's policies now beyond any doubt is that they are wildly optimistic and woefully lacking in precise detail. There never seems to be any thinking of how the thing will work beyond the big idea. This RET scheme and the specific measures it advocates are completely discredited by having been born of a Labor government congenitally addicted to fantasy.

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