Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I opposed Labor's policies. I opposed their approach to the issues you were referring to. I didn't agree with the way that they wanted to do that, and the Australian people agreed with me. The approach that the Labor Party were seeking to take at the last election on those matters was not an approach that I agreed with. We had policies that were supportive of electric vehicles and renewable technologies—all of these things—at the last election, and the Australian people supported those policies. And we want to keep doing that.

Under our policies, we want to see more and more investment going into these areas. That is why we are trying to change ARENA's mandate, so that they can invest in these important technologies. There is $192.5 million in support for lower-emissions technologies, including $72 million to support EVs, electric vehicles, and hydrogen vehicle charging infrastructure; more than $52 million for microgrids in regional Australia—and I know the member for Indi will be interested in that; over $20 million to look at how we can make heavy trucks more fuel-efficient and adopt new technologies; and $47 million to help heavy industry to reduce their energy consumption. That is what we're trying do. The Labor Party are voting against all of those things by supporting the disallowance motion that would prevent us from investing in those renewable technologies, in particular on electric vehicles and hydrogen vehicle charging infrastructure.

So I'm not going to cop the hypocrisy of the Labor Party, whose policies were rejected at the last election because they were carried away with a fantasy. They overreached and the Australian people caught them out and said, 'We're not going to pay for your policies that you haven't thought through.' That is what they are not going to pay for, and the Labor party are still in the same place. They still have not thought their policies through. They still have not prepared a plan for how they will achieve their targets. They don't even have a 2030 target, and they are going to the Australian people and saying, 'Just trust us.' Who would trust the Labor Party with an economic policy to take Australia through one of the biggest changes in the global economy that is occurring with energy than we have seen in at least a generation, if not 50 years? The Labor Party cannot be trusted to manage the economy through this major change.

Our policies will set out very clear plans. There will be technology; there won't be taxes. There will be clear respect for people's choices. We won't be mandating what they should buy, when they should buy it and where they should buy it. We are going to let Australians make their own minds up because we trust Australians to make good choices in their interest—and they will have lower taxes to pay for them too, courtesy of the Treasurer. You cannot trust Labor on their emissions policy. (Time expired)

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