Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

Today I want to table, with the indulgence of the chair, a community petition on climate change signed by around 200 of my constituents. They came to see me in my office. This shows that, as we talk about energy prices here in Australia, people are still concerned about climate and energy together. It is not just about energy prices; it is about energy prices and about climate change. Indeed, these petitioners want us to commit to deeper and more urgent reductions of greenhouse emissions, they want a plan to ensure Australia achieves zero net greenhouse emissions by 2050—obviously I don't agree with everything that my petitioners are asking for—and they want to provide additional assistance to help our poorest neighbours adapt to the harmful impacts of climate change. They have presented this petition because they are concerned about climate change in a state where over 80 per cent of our electricity generation is already renewable, with our hydro-electric scheme. The Tasmanian people have invested billions of dollars over decades in our hydro and windfarm renewable energy. So Tasmania has baseload renewable energy already, with over 80 per cent of our state's power being generated through renewable energy at the moment.

But we've had a lot of debate in this place in recent days, because what we've seen from the government over four years is complete inaction. They had a plan to wreck Labor's climate change and energy plans, which they did—one might say very successfully. But of course there was nothing then to fill that vacuum of policy. There was no plan to deal with climate change and energy prices in Australia, and now, two months since the government got Chief Scientist Alan Finkel's report talking about an urgent need for a clear and early decision on what we're doing in relation to a clean energy target, we still have nothing.

It is the policy paralysis of this government when it comes to energy and climate change policies in Australia that is causing the energy price rises. In four years, all we've had is two cups of tea with energy retailers. I can tell you, on behalf of Tasmanians, that doesn't help us. We have one monopoly retailer. We are not going to get any cheap discounts or anything like that. We're not going to get people writing to us about better deals. That is not happening in Tasmania. Tasmanians today are continuing to struggle to pay their electricity bills, even though we've invested billions in renewables and have done the right thing by the climate. Even though we have done the right thing, we are still being penalised because of the inaction of this government and the failure to recognise those billions of dollars of investment that the Tasmanian population have put into renewable energy. It is simply not good enough, and the government needs to act.

I would like to table the document.

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