Mark Butler (Port Adelaide, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Climate Change and Water) Share this | Hansard source

It was four years ago last week that the Liberal Party made a memorable promise to the Australian people. On a whim, it would appear, the Leader of the Liberal Party then said that there would be 'no cuts to education, no cuts to health, no change to pensions' and 'no cuts to the ABC or SBS' under a Liberal government that might be elected in 2013, and, within only a few months, each and every one of those promises was smashed in the 2014 budget.

But Australians also remember another solemn promise made by the Liberal Party in the lead-in to that election in 2013, and that was that Australian households would be $550 better off in their energy prices if a Liberal government were elected in 2013. And this, perhaps unlike the other promise, was not a whim at the end of an election campaign. This was a promise that the member for Warringah repeated day in, day out, as he angrily marched up and down the country railing against climate and energy policy. Well now, into the fifth year of this government, Australians also know that that was a lie as well. Far from being $550 better off under this government, the average Sydney household is almost $1,000 worse off just in its electricity bills since 2013—$1,000 worse off. That is a $1,500 gap every year. Indeed, it's likely to be a gap that grows next year.

The Prime Minister, in question time just now, sought to deny the AER data. When I tried to table the data to show the government what we were relying on in those figures, the Prime Minister and the Leader of the House denied me the ability to do that. So what I will do is read into the transcript the AER data that The Australian newspaper published on their front page on 10 July 2017. It said:

The regulator data shows the average Sydney household has been hit with annual electricity bill rises of 11.6, 11.7, 10.6, 10 and 10.8 per cent since June 2013 …

Cumulatively, that is a 75 per cent increase in power bills since 2013, when this government was elected. An average household power bill is $935 up, not $550 down, from 2013. Businesses also haven't been spared from this. Businesses have been talking to members on both sides of the House, I'm sure, about the power contract negotiations they're now subject to that are seeing power prices go up by as much as 100 per cent for businesses across Australia under this government.

This government's stunning failure has also seen closures of seven old coal-fired power stations across the system. That amounts to a loss of 4,000 megawatts of power, which is equivalent to six million households, or every household in Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne combined. Old coal-fired power stations close. We on this side of the House recognise that reality. The problem, though, is that there is no additional supply being built. The Prime Minister talked about 2½ thousand megawatts of gas-fired generation being added to the system in the last decade. That was all under us. Not a single new gas-fired generator has been added under this government. In a shocking indictment of this government's failure on energy policy, the AEMO reports last week warned that—

Mr Frydenberg interjecting—

That was opened well before you were there. The AEMO reports last week warn that two-thirds of our nation are now at risk of blackout—

Mr Frydenberg interjecting—

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