Sharon Claydon (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

If ever there were a case study of the complete and utter failure of a government to plan for the future, it would indeed be the Abbott Liberal government's failure to plan for a renewable energy future for Australia. They are so out of touch, out of favour and out of order. Their views are now so completely skewed on this issue that contributions opposite have dared suggest that current policy mechanisms put in place by this government are going to add—somehow, miraculously—to employment gains for Australia.

We hear members opposite launch the very sad but predictable attack on Labor's commitment to renewable energies here. The spectre of the carbon tax is very quickly raised on each and every occasion, by those members opposite saying what damage it did to jobs. Let us remind members opposite of the unemployment figures that are around today. They are the very highest since Tony Abbott, the Prime Minister, was himself the minister for employment: 800,000. In my electorate of Newcastle, 610 shipbuilding jobs have gone under his watch. So let us not pretend that members opposite have any answers when it comes to employment.

Indeed, if members opposite took any notice whatsoever of the feedback from their so-called listening posts, mobile offices or even regular interactions with their constituents, they would know full well that renewable energy is overwhelmingly popular with Australians—not just in the metropolitan areas, as was suggested by the member for Parkes, but indeed in regional Australia, in areas like Newcastle and the Hunter Region. We know that more than 80 per cent of Australians have now locked in their support for renewable energy.

I speak as a member who has the electorate with the largest coal export port in the world. I am not naive about the contribution of fossil fuels to my regional economy. But you know what? The last thing that I and members in my region should do is bury our heads in the sand and pretend that we do not have to plan for some kind of transition to clean energy in the future.

See this speech in context