Sharon Claydon (Newcastle, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

If ever there was a region both well positioned and, indeed, capable of tackling the real challenges of climate change, and taking full advantage of the opportunities that lay ahead, it is Newcastle and the Hunter region. I am literally on the coalface of this change. There's probably a bit of a different perspective in North Sydney, but we are full of confidence about where this government is taking this nation. Newcastle and the Hunter have literally powered this nation for generations. With the right policy settings and investments, our government is ensuring that we will continue to power Australia, albeit in new forms of energy, for many generations to come. The Albanese Labor government is absolutely committed to supporting regions like mine that are carbon-intensive economies to take full advantage of the economic and job opportunities that will come with more affordable and reliable renewable energy.

Key to this orderly and positive transition is the Net Zero Economy Authority, which the Net Zero Economy Authority Bill 2024 is establishing. The net zero authority will ensure that workers, industries and communities are supported through this change and that we will be able to seize the opportunities of Australia's net zero transition. This is a huge job. I'm not sure that all members appreciate the scale at which this transition has to keep pace. This is turning around an entire economy. This government does not underestimate the task ahead. I mean it when I say that it is our generation's industrial revolution. We don't have time for Luddites. We don't have time to repeat that. But we do not underestimate the challenges that also come with this transition.

The authority will support workers in emission-intensive industries who are affected by the net zero transition to access new employment or acquire new skills to improve their employment prospects. The authority will also be a partner on behalf of government with industry, communities and investors in getting big transformational projects happening. As the Hunter's coal-fired power stations retire, the authority will work with those employers, with the unions and with the education and training institutions to support workers into new opportunities. This is not just the right thing to do by workers, even though that's a good enough reason in and of itself. It also ensures that we are making good use of the highly skilled workers that we're going to need in this net zero transformation, because the way we navigate economic change is as important as reaching the destination of a net zero economy.

I've got to remind the House that Newcastle is not afraid of change. We have the infrastructure, the assets and the industrial smarts to be at the forefront of this transition to a net zero economy. Our existing electricity transmission infrastructure makes connecting new energy into the grid a simpler proposition than in many other regions, because we have a highly skilled workforce that is very experienced in the generation, distribution and storage of energy. This is dangerous work for lots of people. We have generations of people who are trained to handle this situation. We have a world-leading university and high-quality TAFE system. We've got a deepwater port, which is utterly essential for this transition—it's a port that's the envy of a lot of port cities around the world, I'd have to say—along with vast amounts of land that is available around that port. This is a scarce commodity for most Australian ports. That land use will be critical in standing up new industries in this region. And we have a thriving and highly collaborative business community, poised to adapt and take advantage of the opportunities ahead.

After a decade of neglect from a government that stuck its head in the sand on climate change and refused to think about how to transition away from fossil fuels and how to work with communities like mine that could be at the very forefront of the work ahead, this Albanese Labor government acknowledges the enormous task ahead, and we have a very, very different approach. We will go to communities like mine and say, 'You can be assured we're not going to be leaving your people behind.' That's why the Albanese labour government has declared an offshore wind zone covering more than 1,854 square kilometres off the coast of Newcastle. The Hunter offshore wind zone has the potential to generate up to five gigawatts of renewable wind energy—enough to power an estimated 4.2 million homes—and will be a critical source of large-scale, reliable, clean energy for our industrial base. It will create up to 3,120 construction jobs and another 1,560 ongoing operational jobs. It's why we've invested $70 million in Origin to develop a Hunter hydrogen hub in collaboration with Orica.

This was the first major agreement struck in Australia that would deliver government investments and a commitment to developing a regional hydrogen hub, and it was no accident that this first agreement took place in Newcastle. This hydrogen hub will produce 5,500 tonnes of green hydrogen per year and support good regional job opportunities. This will lead to a significant reduction in CO2 emissions from the site, and it will fuel carbon-free buses and heavy trucks. Becoming a global hydrogen leader requires significant investment, and our $2 billion Hydrogen Headstart program will provide an additional revenue support for large-scale renewable hydrogen projects. Two out of the six national hydrogen projects shortlisted come from Newcastle. That is a clear indication of the strength of our region.

Just north-west of Newcastle, plans are underway to manufacture world-leading solar cells at the old Liddell coal-fired power station. Solar panels are an Australian invention, but fewer than one per cent are manufactured in Australia. We have 3.7 million rooftops covered in solar panels in Australia now—great job—but fewer than one per cent are made in Australia. Our government wants to change that; we want a future made in Australia. Once operational, the new solar manufacturing facility is expected to deliver more jobs than Lindell did as a coal-fired power station. This is a great story to tell in carbon intensive regions like mine. And these are going to be good, secure jobs.

At the Port of Newcastle construction has started on a low-carbon manufacturing plant being built by the amazing local manufacturer MCi Carbon. It will capture CO2 direct from Orica's Kooragang Island manufacturing plant and transform it into building materials like cement and plasterboard. Once operational, it's set to transform more than 1,000 tonnes of CO2 per annum and provide decarbonisation pathways for hard-to-abate sectors, including steel, cement, mining, chemicals and manufacturing. These are all things that are rich in my area and hard to abate. Central to this renewable energy development is the Port of Newcastle. The government has invested $100 million into the port to ensure its hydrogen readiness and to create a landmark clean-energy precinct. For the port, where coal currently represents 94 per cent of our trade exports, the need to diversify has never been more important. Let me say it again: we've got a lot of skin into this game. Novocastrians are up for the change. We will help lead the change. We will help show our metropolitan cousins how it's done.

The final piece of our puzzle is, of course, skills and education. As we plan for the renewable energy focused future, we cannot overestimate the importance of skills and education to the development of our region. Education and training will be critical to meeting the demands of the new energy sector and our community, and that includes ensuring our higher education facilities, like the TAFE and the University of Newcastle, remain affordable and accessible throughout the Hunter region and are focused on equitable outcomes. We must make sure that our educational institutions are aligned with principles of equity to deliver good outcomes for both industry and the community. The Albanese Labor government know this. It's why we provided $16 million to the University of Newcastle to establish a new energy skills hub. It's why we're investing in TAFE centres of excellence to help deliver a skilled workforce for the future. It's why we're investing in more than 600,000 fee-free TAFE places in priority skills areas, 60 per cent of which are being taken up by women. We're supporting new energy apprentices by giving them $10,000 over the course of their apprenticeship to relieve cost-of-living pressures. The Net Zero Economy Authority will be key to this.

As I said, the authority will be there to support workers in emissions intensive regions to access new employment and acquire skills to take advantage of the net zero transformation. It will support, develop and deliver educational initiatives for the purpose of promoting an understanding of Australia's transition to a net zero emissions economy and support social licence for this transition. I don't think any of us in this chamber should underestimate the challenges ahead.

In the generation, distribution and storage of electricity, there is now a great opportunity for us to disrupt what traditionally has been a male-dominated sector. When I visited Denmark and north-east Scotland to look at their offshore wind industries, I couldn't help but notice that they remained—in the case of Denmark, despite all of the great social policy settings that exist in Nordic countries—very male dominated. With the historical shift from the offshore oil and gas industry to renewables, we in Australia have an opportunity to break that cycle and make sure that women are centred in the renewable energy sector. That makes good economic sense for us. It's why it is supported by local Hunter businesses as well as the big nationals: the Business Council of Australia, the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors, the Climate Council, the Australia Energy Council, the Australian Industry Group, the Clean Energy Council, the National Farmers Federation, ACOSS, the ACTU, the AMWU, the MUA and the MEU.

As I said, in Newcastle we're not afraid of change. We have been through major industrial upheavals in the past and we're not intimidated by change on this scale. When BHP closed its doors in Newcastle, some 25 years ago, many people here and elsewhere wrote us off. At BHP's peak, 11,000 people worked there—generations of men, including my father, from Newcastle and right across our region. When someone employs 11,000 people, it's a big deal when they shut their doors. While this significant employer and part of our local community was suddenly gone, through a decision made in a boardroom overseas, we Novocastrians picked ourselves up, retrained and diversified. We took on new jobs in new industries. Growth and innovation have now made health and education my two biggest employers. Newcastle has continued to flourish. I know that, like in that moment in 1999, Novocastrians are again ready to embrace the new challenges and opportunities ahead.

All this is why the federal government sees Newcastle and the Hunter as such a central place in our energy transformation, and it's why the Net Zero Economy Authority will be so vital to this transition. I give my full support to this bill.

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