Keith Pitt (Hinkler, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

What a fantastic opportunity it is to attack those opposite for not delivering $275 reductions in electricity prices. The people that I represent cannot afford continued increases for electricity and for gas. They need well-paid jobs, and yet we see those opposite not only intervening in the market but capping it. They are capping the market, and what is the result? We have seen a forecast for a shortfall of gas. I say to the Victorian state Premier: how about you actually go and develop some? If you developed some gas, you might have some available. You can't go to Queensland and expect to shift the entire demand for the state of Victoria from Gladstone. It is not physically possible. The infrastructure doesn't exist, and you certainly can't do it for the same price as you would see from the Bass Strait.

It is a statement of fact that the Bass Strait is in decline. There is less gas coming from the Bass Strait. It has been a great resource, but, if you do not develop your own resources as a state, you will run out. Who will pay the price? The people that live there. It'll be those who can least afford it. It'll be those individuals that can't pay their power bills, and we are seeing increase after increase after increase from those opposite, because they do not know how to manage the economy. So I say once again: why do you always pay more under Labor?

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