Darren Chester (Gippsland, National Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Education) Share this | Hansard source

My purpose in supporting the member for O'Connor in moving this motion is to highlight the role that natural gas has played in our nation historically but also the role it continues to play today and into the future. I also want to take the opportunity to raise my concerns about some of the extreme green madness I'm seeing in my own state. It's coming primarily from members of the Greens party but also from some members of the Labor Party. They want to abandon gas altogether as an energy source in my state. It reminds me of the debate we've been having in Victoria in relation to native timber, where we have a coalition of Labor and Greens members in the urban areas telling country people what jobs they can and can't have. They're quite happy to take hardwood timber from other countries and other states but not prepared to use their own timber from their own state.

My direct experience in this area relates to the offshore oil and gas activity in the Bass Strait basin. For more than 50 years now, the joint venture partners have worked in Bass Strait generating oil and gas; in more recent times, gas has been the more dominant resource harvested. That has underpinned the wealth of Gippsland, and Victoria more broadly. It has provided a cheap and reliable energy source which has been incredibly important for my region, and we're directly impacted by government policies in this area.

It's important to point out that natural gas remains a key pillar of the Australian economy. It employs 80,000 people in the industry supply chain, largely in regional areas like mine. Natural gas is connected to more than five million Australian homes, and in 2022 it provided 42 per cent of the energy consumed by the Australian manufacturing sector. I find it to be madness to listen to the Victorian environment minister calling for a complete ban on new gas connections in residential areas. It is also important to note the contribution the natural gas sector provides to governments, with $17.1 billion in taxes, royalties and charges in 2023-24, which obviously allows governments to invest in critical services and public infrastructure.

I am reminded of the Treasurer's budget speech last year, when he noted the improved fiscal outlook—the improvement to the budget bottom line—and he attributed that to higher prices for 'the things we sell overseas'. I've got to say I was staggered. The Treasurer of Australia couldn't bring himself to say what those things were. He couldn't say 'coal', 'iron ore', 'gas' or 'agricultural products'. He was too embarrassed for some reason—a Labor treasurer too embarrassed to mention what those things we sell overseas are. I'm not embarrassed to mention them. I'm proud of the people right across Australia, particularly in regional Australia, in those industries. They leave their homes, often travelling interstate—they're often fly-in fly-out workers—to access these resources which underpin the wealth of our nation. They keep the lights on. They earn those export dollars that pay for the schools, the hospitals, the roads—everything we want in our own electorates—and the Treasurer of Australia was only prepared to say 'the things we sell overseas'.

This industry is desperate for some policy certainty going into the future. It's desperate for some policy certainty from government so it can make the long-term investment decisions which will allow those companies to continue to be part of the energy solution both at home here in Australia and abroad, particularly in the Asian region. It's desperate for policy certainty which will allow it to continue to employ those thousands of Australians in a wide range of areas. I believe in a balanced approach to the challenge of reducing our emissions. I believe we will be seeing more and more renewables in the market in the future. In fact, gas is an important element to that balanced approach because gas can underpin the intermittency of some of the solar and wind resources we're bringing onstream around Australia at the moment. I support the member for O'Connor in urging the federal government to take urgent action to provide that policy certainty which allows industry to bring on that new gas supply needed to address the forecast shortfalls, to ensure we can have energy security and to rebuild investor confidence around our nation.

In conclusion, I point out that Australian natural gas is the foundation of energy security and helping us achieve net zero in our region. Australian LNG represents a significant pillar of energy and demand in the region, and the forecast demand is expected to grow. Demand in the South-East Asian region is forecast to increase as much as tenfold by 2050. These exports, as I've already pointed out, are so critical in helping us as a nation achieve the funding required to invest in the resources and public infrastructure we want in our electorates right across Australia. I urge those opposite to come on board and support the gas sector.

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