Damian Drum (Nicholls, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to acknowledge the member who has put this on the table. It is a fantastic motion by Mr Ramsey, who has spoken about gas and put it on the agenda because it is so critically important for the electorates that have a very strong reliance on manufacturing.

In my particular area, it tends to be with food manufacturing—SPC, Campbell's soups, Kagome soups—and it goes into steel manufacturing, and there's Unilever and all the milk processors. They're all heavily dependent on gas but other forms of energy as well they're very reliant on; they're big energy users. Gas is seen as this transitional energy source as we go to an area of cleaner energy, but right at the moment we need dispatchable sources of energy. We need energy when we need it, and sometimes intermittent energy sources let us down. When we have food manufacturing, we cannot afford to go without energy when we need it. This is why gas is so critically important. So I acknowledge the member for Grey for putting this on the table.

The 850,000 people who are supported through the manufacturing sector are very relevant, certainly when you go into my electorate of Nicholls. We've had a number of round tables, going back to 2016 or 2017, where the price of gas was going through the roof. Industry leaders came to the electorate office needing to impart their experience to make sure that their voices and situations were heard in Canberra. Now we see that the policies of the coalition have, essentially, brought down the prices of gas and electricity. So I think it's a little bit selective of the previous speaker to say that our policies aren't working. We must also acknowledge that gas has a great opportunity to be the transitional form of energy we need, and our industries will be highly supportive of us if we can get there.

The crucial nature of food manufacturing throughout the Goulburn Valley is part of the agricultural chain that exists within northern Victoria. It fits hand in glove with the agricultural sector. It's as critical as the farmers. It's as critical as the support that we offer. It's as critical as the water that we make available for our irrigation within the Goulburn Valley. At the end of the chain is this food manufacturing, and if one part of this chain falls over it's goodnight for everybody. So we have to look at the crucial role of cheap, affordable, reliable and flexible energy, and that's gas. Right at the moment, as we all push to where we want to be into the future, which is a cleaner environment, as we transition towards that space, we have to acknowledge the incredible role that gas is going to play.

I would suggest that in my electorate we're probably talking about 15,000 to 20,000 people who would be directly or indirectly employed through agriculture, food manufacturing and associated industries. It's an absolutely incredible part of northern Victoria. There are some 13 different milk manufacturing, milk processing, factories. Then there are all the fruit and vegetables and Unilever. It is an incredibly complex situation. Right at the crux of all of these industries, right at the crux of all of these families, is the ability for them to have a flexible, affordable, reliable energy source, and, at the moment, that energy source is gas.

We understand there will always be those who simply consider gas in the same vein as coal. They wish to be selective with their facts about the emissions associated with the production of gas. They wish to be selective with their figures around the true cost of renewable energy. I sometimes think we need to get this debate back on an even keel, to have some common sense and reality and practicality around this debate and stop being so political.

See this speech in context