Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Infrastructure) Share this | Hansard source

In office, maybe, not in power. They're responsible, over those five years, for a doubling of wholesale energy prices and for the retirement of 5,000 megawatts of coal-fired power without adequate replacement. That is on his desk. That occurred on his watch, but he would have us forget all about that. He would have us forget it, think that we'd just woken up and that yesterday was September 2013 and now we're here, with nothing in between. But what we've had is five years of coalition infighting on energy policy that has led to a doubling of wholesale energy prices. We had Direct Action for three years—that 'fig leaf' and 'fiscal recklessness', as the Prime Minister referred to it. We had Josh's emissions intensity scheme for 12 hours, and what a glorious 12 hours it was! The minister did an interview with Fran Kelly in the morning, which was quite articulate, quite reasonable, quite sensible. Within 12 hours, he'd surrendered. I've had indigestion for longer than Josh's EIS policy! That's the sad truth of Josh's approach.

We had the clean energy target for a year. Again, it was junked because he couldn't get it through the conservatives in his own party room. Now we've landed at the National Energy Guarantee, the NEG, founded on a six-page letter. We had the minister and the Prime Minister claiming credit today that they stood up to the bullies in the party room and they stood down the conservatives. They stood them down. Unfortunately, seven words undermine his argument completely. Seven words undermine his argument about the NEG: as endorsed by Barnaby Joyce. 'As endorsed by Barnaby Joyce' is the sad truth of this policy. This is abject surrender. This is the equivalent of a nation that's been invaded—as the foreign troops are walking down their main avenue—doing a press conference, saying, 'That was our plan all along. Having those foreign troops walking down our avenues was the plan all along.' It's a sad, sad indictment of energy policy in this country. Such is their abject surrender.

What would the NEG deliver in terms of decarbonising our economy? It would deliver four wind turbines over a decade—not four wind farms, four wind turbines. That is less than what we put in place each week! That is the sad truth of this policy: emissions reductions of fewer than two per cent over a decade. What's even worse is that we're now at a stage in the energy market where investing in renewable energy is also investing in lower power prices. So, by standing in opposition to renewable energy and decarbonising our economy, they are also standing in opposition to reducing power prices. That is the sad truth of their stance. It's been confirmed by RepuTex's economic modelling, which said that if Labor's policy of around 45 per cent emissions reduction is adopted then power prices will be 25 per cent lower than under the proposal by the coalition. Even if you look at the government's claimed $550 of power savings, $400 of the $550 comes from Labor's Renewable Energy Target, not their NEG.

The sad truth is they are standing against the tide of history. The brutal economic facts are that if you support renewable energy you will not only decarbonise the economy; you will also drive lower power prices. You can achieve both. They stand in opposition to both, because the Prime Minister and the minister couldn't stand up to the former Prime Minister, the member for Warringah; they couldn't stand up to the member for New England; they couldn't stand up to all the other fossils in the party room. But it's not just them who will suffer. It's households in our electorates that will suffer. It's our children who will suffer. It's our grandchildren who will suffer. The government will be condemned by history for this abject surrender. They truly are the quislings, the Vichy French in this debate, giving up all the— (Time expired)

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