Josh Burns (Macnamara, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion by my good friend the member for McMahon. I am pleased that there are a few modern Liberals in the building today, but they should change their name from modern Liberals to compliant Liberals, or even silent Liberals, because under this government we have seen a systematic attack on the institutions that were designed and brought in by this country and by the previous Labor government to bring down the amount of emissions and to bring down the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere by bringing in renewable technology.

I'm pleased the minister's also joined us, because it means he's taken a bit of time away from the City of Sydney website and he's stopped downloading documents to actually join us here for this motion. This is the latest in a series of systematic attacks on the proud Labor institutions of this place and of this country to invest in renewable energy. Of course, we had the story of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, where they wanted to take the clean energy out of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. They also wanted to take the finance out of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, by putting in amendments that were going to mean that the Clean Energy Finance Corporation didn't have to invest in clean energy. If you're going to design amendments for the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, that would be the thing you couldn't do, because that's why it's called the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. Of course, there's nothing from the compliant Liberals and nothing from the silent Liberals over there. I know the member for Goldstein wants to do nuclear technology and wants to build a Brighton Beach nuclear reactor, right next to the huts. He wants a big Brighton Beach nuclear reactor next to the huts. Then you've also got the member for Wentworth who wants the Bondi nuclear reactor. He wants that one as well.

We on this side of the House are proud of the institutions that we set up in government for investing in renewable energy and bringing down the amount of greenhouse gases that we emit as a country. Of course, that's not the end of the story with the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. They didn't want to just take out the clean energy bit. They didn't want to just make the Clean Energy Finance Corporation able to invest in projects that didn't stack up financially. They had other plans. The member for New England had other plans. I'm not sure if the member for New England gave the member for Hume a bit of a heads up on his amendments. I'm not sure if he knocked on the minister's door and said, 'Minister, I've got a few amendments for the Clean Energy Finance Corporation bill. I'm just going to put them into the House. It should be fine, nothing to see here.' Obviously, if the minister really was there alongside the member for New England, he would still have a bill, but we haven't seen a bill in months. Where is the bill, Minister? I can't see the bill. The bill has gone and the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, thanks to the member for New England, ironically, is going to stay as it is.

Now we have ARENA. They wanted to take the clean energy part out of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, and now they want to take the renewable part out of the Australian Renewable Energy Agency. The legacy of this government is to disband and attack the very institutions that are meant to drive up renewable energy investment in this country so as to make Australia more renewable, be powered by renewables and bring in cheaper and cleaner energy. Instead, this government wants to systematically undermine the efforts of the previous Labor government.

It's not just those two institutions: there was also the incident with the NAIF where the minister was presented with a project by the department. The department said: 'This wind farm stacks up. It makes sense. This should be invested in by the public. It's going to create jobs and it's going to bring down power prices.' But, as with everything else, this government and these Liberals are ideologically opposed to renewable energy. They are ideologically opposed to investing in cleaner and cheaper energy. They are ideologically opposed to investing in cheaper and cleaner energy.

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