Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Hansard source

A couple of weeks ago, we saw the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis release a report on the prospects of nuclear energy for Australia, and it found that electricity bills would rise by $665 a year for a median electricity bill and by more than $1,000 for a family of four. Now, that analysis makes a certain sense when you consider that nuclear is the most expensive form of energy available in the world. So, of course, if you introduce it into Australia, we're going to see energy prices go up.

But there have been other developments. Last night we saw some; we saw about 45 minutes of developments on Four Corners last night. It's a bit unusual for a minister to recommend watching a show about an opposition policy. But I do say to the House, if you didn't see Four Corners last night, it's a cracker. We had 45 minutes of expert after expert talking about nuclear policy. We saw Peter Bradford, a former commissioner of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, say:

What we know about nuclear is that's it's very capable of large disappointments.

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If nuclear was a person, it would be weeping with its head in its hands over the Vogtle story in Georgia.

We saw Stephanie Cooke, the former editor of Nuclear Intelligence Weekly, say:

It amazes me that there's so much hype about something that's been such an abject failure in my opinion. I mean, yeah, it's produced electricity, but at what cost?

I recommend that show and I recommend the analysis of the opposition policy—because they can't release the details because the details would show the policy is a dog.

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