Michelle Ananda-Rajah (Higgins, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

():  I move:

That this House:

(1) notes the clear message the Australian people sent in May 2022, demanding real action on climate change by electing the current Government;

(2) further notes the Government has not wasted a day by:

(a) increasing Australia's emission reduction targets from 26 per cent to 43 per cent;

(b) legislating to bring back the Climate Change Authority;

(c) putting net zero in the objects of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and Australian Renewable Energy Agency Acts;

(d) legislating our $20 billion Rewiring the Nation Fund;

(e) taking substantial steps to create an offshore wind industry in Australia;

(f) agreeing to a sensible capacity investment scheme with the states;

(g) working with states and territories to put emissions reduction into the National Energy Objectives, and to develop a new National Energy Transformation Partnership;

(h) signing the Global Methane Pledge and joining the Climate Change Club and Global Offshore Wind Alliance;

(i) reforming the safeguard mechanism so that our biggest industrial emitters are doing their fair share;

(j) passing the electric vehicle discount, releasing the National Electric Vehicle Strategy and commencing the rollout of the Driving the Nation charging program;

(k) committing $1.7 billion to the Energy Savings Program, providing real financial support to households, businesses, and local governments to invest in renewable energy and energy efficiency;

(l) signing funding agreements to deliver more than 50 community batteries around Australia;

(m) establishing the Net Zero Economy Agency to have a laser-like focus on the economic opportunities for the regions at the centre of the energy transformation; and

(n) budgeting $2 billion for the vital Hydrogen Headstart Program; and

(3) acknowledges that this is just another way the Government is working for Australia and delivering on the promise of building the better future Australians voted for.

We are living through the era of consequences when it comes to climate change. Extreme weather events, whether they be fires, floods, heat waves or indeed extreme cold snaps have become a new dystopian reality. But we also are now in an era of a responsive government that is trying its hardest to turn this supertanker around. For the first time, after a decade of denial and delay, we have a coherent energy policy. It is a policy that is focused on energy generation, energy distribution and indeed energy storage; three pillars to having a coherent, all-of-society approach to climate change. We legislated targets. This was one of the earliest acts that we performed as a government. We now have legislated targets which take us on a trajectory to net zero, and in just one year we've seen the effects of this investment signal.

We started off with renewable energy sitting at 33 per cent; it is now at around 38 or 39 per cent, and that hasn't happened by accident. We have a massive uplift required in order to get us to our 2030 target, which will be 82 per cent renewable energy. Some say that is too ambitious. We think that is achievable, but we realise that we have a lot of work to do. We've also imposed tough emission controls on our heaviest emitters through the safeguard mechanism—actually putting teeth on this mechanism—which it didn't previously have. That means it will be equivalent to taking two-thirds of Australia's cars off the roads. It's actually quite difficult when you think about the emitters that we're actually talking about—big oil, big gas, coal mines and so on—but eventually this same safeguard mechanism will also be invoked for renewable energy projects—gigascale wind farms, for example, critical mineral mines and so on.

In addition to this, we have committed $20 billion to Rewiring the Nation to modernise our grid so that it is renewable ready. We've have announced six offshore wind zones, including one off the Bass Strait. This will enable Tasmania to reach an ambitious target of 200 per cent renewable energy. It is an absolutely fantastic announcement. It also means it has partnered us with other groups worldwide in the Global Offshore Wind Alliance. Australia is now a signatory to that.

With respect to the next stages, we have announced six sectoral plans. We're taking a sector by sector approach to decarbonise our country. That means we are tailoring plans for the electricity and energy market industry, agriculture, the built environment, transport and the resource sector. With respect to transport, for the first time in Commonwealth history, Australia has a national EV strategy. This strategy was designed with stakeholders and it means that we've introduced tax cuts for electric vehicles, which has resulted in an uplift in sales from two per cent to nine per cent, but we want to go further. This EV strategy is also partnered with $500 million towards a national charging infrastructure, which includes eventually rolling out hydrogen on our highways for our heavy vehicles. With respect to green hydrogen this is a small molecule with big ambitions. We have devoted $2 billion to a Hydrogen Headstart program in our last budget. This will enable Australia to create the liquid fuel that will eventually replace diesel and petrol for our heavy machinery and heavy industry.

With respect to storage, we want to keep the lights on with green energy, and that's why we have introduced a Capacity Investment Scheme with $10 billion towards it, and it's why we are rolling out 400 community batteries across the nation at a cost of $400 million. But that's not all—we're wrapping integrity around this, because there is a lot of money involved in this transition. Across two budgets, we have committed $40 billion of public money, and this is why we've introduced the National Anti-Corruption Commission. We've also strengthened the Climate Change Authority, a legacy of the Gillard government, and we have pumped another $46 million into this authority that was starved under those opposite. We commissioned the Chubb review to look at offsets, and we also dispensed with the dodgy Kyoto credits of the previous government. We have a lot to do, and the climate piece will be integrating with a lot of other work, including industry and skills.

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