Ted O'Brien (Fairfax, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Hansard source

Well, it is the day after the new government's first budget, and we all know it is a budget littered with broken promises. Now, I can tell you about all 275 broken promises that I have on my mind right now, and they're all related to power prices. Every single Labor member in this chamber was elected to this House on the basis of a promise—a promise made no less than 97 times. That promise was that household power bills would come down by $275. Today in question time, yet again, we asked the Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the responsible minister to confirm the promise that they told the Australian people, but they couldn't, because they know it's a broken promise.

Last night, the new government's own budget put in black and white the very thing that the Prime Minister has not had the courage himself to say—that is that the $275 promise has been broken, entirely broken, because electricity prices, already skyrocketing, will go up by another 50 per cent and gas prices by 40 per cent. This is a clear broken promise, and it comes after the coalition government not only delivered on its emissions targets—not only reduced emissions by over 20 per cent on 2005 levels—but also reduced the price of power for households by eight per cent, for businesses by 10 per cent and for industry by 12 per cent. Yet the Labor Party assured the Australian people they could do better—they could reduce the price further—and it has only been going up since.

We know that the cost of living is the key issue for Australians right now. The government conceded this last night—that, because inflation is going up, they need a cost-of-living plan. But if you go to the budget papers, in particular Budget Paper No. 1, and look at the economic outlook section, within the pages on inflation, the most common theme about what is driving inflation now is the increasing price of energy. Energy is going through the roof in terms of its cost for businesses and households. That's the No. 1 issue driving inflation, according to the first budget paper. So then you might turn up and say: 'Right. What's the government's plan? What is the government going to do about it?' The government has a cost-of-living plan. It's got five points, but nowhere in that does the government address the issue of the cost of power. First, the government breaks the promise; second, it has a so-called cost-of-living plan that excludes any consideration for reducing people's power prices.

Believe it or not, there's a more serious long-term issue we have here with the broken promise and Labor's first budget. The $275 promise was based on economic modelling. We now know, through the government's own budget papers, that that economic modelling is flawed. We also know that because today neither the Prime Minister, the Treasurer nor the minister would actually stand by that modelling. Yet here's the deal: the modelling, which is flawed and is now proven to be flawed, is the exact modelling that the government has based its entire energy policy on. Its entire energy policy is based on that same economic modelling. The member for Whitlam was boasting about legislating targets only a moment ago. The government went to this House and legislated targets for emissions reduction without having the department do any economic modelling. What was it based on? The same flawed economic modelling that has now been revealed. This is why Australia's energy sector is going to become an absolute train wreck. It will be a train wreck because, we now know and Australians know, it's based on economic modelling that is flawed. The government knows it. The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and the minister cannot defend it, and that train wreck will be on them. It will be on the Labor government.

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