Peter Hendy (Eden-Monaro, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have some questions to direct to the minister. Minister, electricity prices are always front of mind in my electorate. In fact you would have noticed that the recent New South Wales election was dominated by electricity issues, particularly whether or not to lease the New South Wales electricity network assets.

One of the arguments used in support of asset privatisation is that privately operated assets are often run more efficiently and result in cheaper electricity bills for customers. This government has always said that it will work hard to put downward pressure on electricity prices. We repealed the carbon tax, and in doing so we provided savings of around $500 a year to an average household.

I notice that new national rules that require electricity network prices to be set with the long-term interests of customers in mind mean that households and businesses in my home state of New South Wales, and also in the ACT, South Australia and Queensland, will see decreases to electricity bills from 1 July this year. I have no doubt that you have plans to keep chipping away at electricity prices to ensure that Australian households and businesses are not paying too much for their electricity. But there is one particular matter I would be interested to hear more about—that is, the national energy productivity plan, which was announced as part of the government's recently released energy white paper. The white paper announced an aspirational national productivity target of up to 40 per cent improvement in productivity by 2030 and a commitment to develop a national energy productivity plan.

Minister, can you please tell us how a productive energy sector contributes to a stronger economy? Can you give us an update on the development of this energy productivity plan? What information is considered when deciding a target, and what kind of opportunities are there for Australia to improve its productivity? How could improving our energy productivity contribute to our broader government goals, such as growing the economy or meeting an international emissions agenda?

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