Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Flinders proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The dramatic collapse in the solar panel sector as a direct consequence of the government’s negligence.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Urban Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Earlier today, World Environment Day, the Leader of the Opposition and I travelled to the home of Phil and Sophia May in Queanbeyan. That is an interesting place to visit because it is the centre of Solartec, which is a home based and family run business. They moved into that home only a few days before this year’s federal budget. They moved in because their business had been successful since the implementation of the solar panel rebate and its elevation to an $8,000 level for all families in the last budget. It is an interesting house to visit for a second reason. This was the family and the business which the Prime Minister and the now Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts visited on 28 March last year. It was where they announced their solar homes policy. What we found today is the reality of this policy. We hear many things from the other side, but the solar rebate policy reduction, which was announced on budget night, can be encapsulated in what has happened to Phil and Sophia May and to their business.

There were three things that Phil and Sophia May told us. Firstly, they said that their business had lost $500,000 in orders in the three weeks since budget day. I want to repeat that—$500,000 in orders for a small family business in the three weeks since budget day. Those are real orders with a real impact on a real family. Secondly, Mr May has had to give notice to three of his five staff. Sixty per cent of the employees in this small business will lose their jobs—three out of five people—and that includes a mature age apprentice. This is not hypothetical. This is not something that may happen down the track. When I look at members on the other side of the chamber they know that this policy decision was a mistake and they are secretly ashamed of it. Mr May said to us that three out of his five employees had been given notice and would lose their jobs, and the Mays were losing their livelihoods as a result. Thirdly, Phil and Sophia May felt a palpable sense of betrayal. I can put it no better than use the words which Sophia May herself used in public, in the Australian on 16 May 2008, just after the budget when she said:

I am absolutely heartbroken that they could bite the hand that helped them promote their policies.

This is a decent, hard-working mum who happens to also take care of their beautiful little two-year-old, Abi. What we saw today was a sense of betrayal in her eyes. When we hear from the minister for the environment and the Prime Minister that this measure will help the solar industry, we know it is Orwellian doublespeak. It denies the fact that there are real families that have been hurt, real employees who are losing their jobs and real consumers who wanted to do the right thing by the environment but who will now never be able to put solar panels on their roofs and make their contribution to reducing Australia’s energy needs and greenhouse footprint.

Let us put this debate in context. Now I understand that from time to time people in this House can be too personal. I do not want to inject a personal note into this debate, so I say across the chamber to the Minister for Environment, Heritage and The Arts, who seems to be a very pleasant person: Do not take this personally, but you are not up to the job, mate!

Let us be absolutely clear: he is not up to the job. And do not take my word for it. Take the Prime Minister’s word for it, because before the election the minister for the environment was also the minister for those small matters of water and climate change but after the election he was no longer the minister for water or climate change; he was the minister for plastic bags and solar panels. And what have we seen? We have seen that he could not fight his way out of a plastic bag and now he has smashed up the solar panels. It has been an exemplary performance in ministerial incompetence.

Let me look directly at the question of what has happened to the solar industry and give some background, which is this: prior to last year and the budget decision, we saw that the $4,000 rebate was helping to install solar panels around Australia. That was lifted by the member for Wentworth in his role at the time; it came to $8,000 and as a result of that we have seen a tripling in demand for solar panels across Australia over the last year. This has led to new jobs, new orders, new development and lower prices. So real things have actually happened so that ordinary Australians can do their bit for the environment. And Australian families who have scrimped and saved for what would otherwise be a $15,000 to $20,000 set of panels can do so without having to pay all of that; they only have to pay the difference. That means they are looking at between $7,000 and $12,000 of their own money. But if you make it $15,000 to $20,000, they simply cannot do it.

Most significantly, what was it that the then Prime Minister, Mr Howard, said? On the Sunrise program on 9 May 2007, he said that it was an uncapped arrangement that would be demand driven. He said:

... it is a demand driven program. So, as many households as want it can have it. I mean, there are estimates made for Budget purposes, but if it turns out to be more popular, well, more money will be made available.

So when we hear from the other side that they have actually tried to increase funding, it is a total fabrication. What has happened, as we all know and as we can see, is that a small business sector has been decimated. Since the budget, two-thirds of their business has been lost. On the estimates of the small business sector, which is the solar panel sector, we are facing about 400 job losses and that will flow through to other consequential job losses. These are real jobs of people who are trying to create a new industry and do the right thing by the environment, as well as the short-changing of Australian families that wanted to be a part of this.

What then do we see? I want to set out a case that there is a duty not to means test this rebate, that there is a breach and that there is real damage. The duty is very simple: it is called an election promise. On his visit to Phil and Sophia May’s house on 28 March 2007, we had this statement from Mr Rudd:

Solar is the most greenhouse-friendly energy available on the planet and, therefore, we just need to take some practical steps to make it possible for as many families as possible to invest in this.

There you go. That is what Mr Rudd said. Their policy was very clear: a non-means-tested approach to the rebate. They supported the rebate after the election. They supported a non-means-tested rebate right up until budget night and then on budget night we had a breach of this duty.

In what way will the impact of this breach work? It sets a means test of $100,000 per household. That means that if you have a mum and dad on $51,000 each—a nurse and a teacher or something equivalent—they are considered rich and they are no longer able to access this rebate. If that sounds hypothetical, what we need to understand is that this is exactly what we have seen. Hamish Wall, the general manager of business development with Nicholls Solar, said on ABC Radio’s The World Today on 16 May 2008:

... we had one household which consisted of a nurse and a teacher and obviously under the Federal Government’s policy, they’re rich and therefore they are no longer eligible for the rebate.

This is a family that has cancelled their order and Nicholls Solar has lost the business. That is what has actually happened.

This is not something that was brought before the House; it was not part of the appropriations bills, so it cannot be stopped there; it was not a decision made by legislation; it was not a decision made under a disallowable instrument; it was a decision that was taken in such a way so as not to be reviewable before the parliament of Australia. It breaches an election promise, it breaks down an existing program and it damages ordinary families. As of midnight on the night of the budget, without any consultation with industry and without any warning whatsoever, the order came into force on the basis of a ‘magisterial’ signature. That is the new way of making the laws of Australia.

Opposition Member:

An opposition member—So much for transparency.

Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Urban Water) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As has been said, so much for transparency and accountability. If you want to know, the third element of this equation is: is there damage? There is clear damage here. There is clear damage to small business. Phil May has put it very simply. He said:

This has kicked the guts out of our company.

And what about the managing director of Conergy, Roger Meads, who said:

Following the government’s solar means test announcement ,Australian families have now cancelled 80 per cent of their solar system orders due to their cost being prohibitive, meaning less solar panels on roofs.

That is the reality. There will be fewer solar panels on roofs. Roger Meads went on to say:

This has translated to immediate job losses across the industry at a time when we believed it had a bright future. It will send the solar power industry back to the early nineties.

What about the industry council, the Clean Energy Council? This is particularly interesting. The communications director of the Clean Energy Council said on 20 May:

The government has killed the industry stone cold dead.

But she also said:

We’ve been blindsided. The industry was not consulted and the consultation we had was not about this.

There was no warning and there was no preparation. There was an executive order signed in a presidential decree, which came in to force as of midnight with no warning, no recourse and no way forward.

Erik Zimmerman, the chief executive of Rezeko, made it absolutely clear when he said on ABC Radio on 17 May 2008:

... with this development you cut 50 per cent of the volume of the market.

It subsequently turned out to be a lot higher. He then said:

... all of a sudden you can’t buy in those volumes. The government is trying to reduce inflation and in this industry all I can see is the possibility of prices going up.

But there are many others who have had a loss. What about the Solar Shop? Adrian Ferraretto, Managing Director of the Solar Shop put it very simply:

We are a national company. Our head office is here in Adelaide. We employ about 100 people. I think it is going to cost us around 2 million bucks a month. That is what we’re estimating if it drops down to 60 per cent.

These are real losses. Minister, I ask that you reverse this decision. I suspect that it was not your idea. I suspect that it was a decision taken in the Expenditure Review Committee of cabinet. I cannot believe that the minister actually advocated this policy. I know, and I think everybody on this side knows, that when the fight was there in the cabinet room the fighter was unfortunately not there to stand up for the solar industry. And it is not just the solar industry. These are small businesses with real jobs and real people, such as Phil May’s three staff members who have lost their positions—a direct and immediate consequence of the budget which must be reversed.

What is our solution? Our solution is very simple. The Leader of the Opposition today visited Phil and Sophia May’s house and announced that the opposition would be introducing into this parliament the ‘save our solar’ solar rebate protection bill. It will be a private member’s bill. We will introduce it into the House and the Senate simultaneously. The bill has a simple purpose. It will seek to overturn the imposition of the means test. The reason it will do that is very simple. It will do that (1) to keep faith with the promise that we made to the Australian people that we would promote the solar industry, (2) to keep faith with people such as Phil and Sophia May, Hamish Wall and Rodger Meads or any of the others who are seeing the collapse of their businesses, (3) to protect the solar industry and (4) to give those families who want to put solar panels on their roofs the chance to do so. That is what we have set up. We are putting in place the ‘save our solar’ bill. It is a private member’s bill.

I am certain it will pass the Senate if it is voted on before the end of June, and I believe it will pass the Senate even if it is voted on after that time, because it has our support and because there is support from the Greens to overturn this position. Let me make it clear: there is support on that side and the question is whether these people over here have the guts to stand up and say in public or in private, ‘This is a disgrace’. There is a member there from the ETU, whose state secretary wrote to me yesterday to say that this was a disgrace. A small business sector has been destroyed. Jobs have been lost. People’s livelihoods have been put on the line. It is a disgrace that the means test has been put into place. I call on the minister to overturn the solar panel rebate means test, to make things right and to give people a chance to put solar panels on their roofs and to save jobs in businesses such as Phil and Sophia May’s.

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise on this matter of public importance to confirm to the House the strong commitment that the Rudd Labor government has to the solar industry—a strong commitment to renewable energy and a strong commitment to action on climate change. I point out to the member for Flinders that the policy that the Rudd Labor government has brought forward will see people get access to twice the number of rebates for solar panels than they otherwise would have. Getting access to twice the number of solar panel rebates means that there will be a sustainable path for the solar industry itself.

I have met with Mr May—just as I have met with other representatives from the solar industry. The Leader of the Opposition, when he was speaking earlier in the House, said, ‘I call on the minister for the environment to show that he is man enough to meet with Mr May.’ I have to advise the House, through you, Madam Deputy Speaker, that I have met with Mr May. I was able to tell him and other representatives from the solar industry of our serious and long-term commitment to the solar industry. I was able to point out to Mr May—and I took some time to do this—the history of the rebate and make reference to the fact that the former government, the Howard government, was contemplating that there be no rebate at all. Not only were they contemplating that there be no rebate at all but it then went to $4,000 and then they contemplated not having a rebate. It was the pressure from this side of the House—from the Labor Party when we were in opposition—to see a rebate in place to enable a sustainable solar industry to get going and keep going that saw that rebate put in place and supported by us.

When we came to government, there was a five-year, $150 million program for solar rebates. The government’s election commitment was to provide rebates for the installation of up to 3,000 household power systems per year over the five years. That mirrored the estimated demand in the coalition’s last budget, but demand for the rebate has been so strong since it was doubled last year that the government responded to that demand by doubling the number of rebates. We will now pay 6,000 rebates through the years 2008-09. So that is more solar panels and more rebates. The total commitment of $150 million remains unchanged. We brought forward $25 million in the budget to achieve in three years what the previous government set out to achieve in five.

The maximum household rebate payable stays at $8,000, but we want to ensure that the greatest number of solar rebates get onto Australian roofs. That is why we have introduced a means test of $100,000 per household: to ensure that the rebates end up in the hands of people who might not otherwise be able to install solar panels on their homes. I am confident that there will be continued demand for the rebates with the new means test. I am confident that we will provide 6,000 rebates in the next financial year and I am confident that the solar industry will benefit from twice the number of rebates that we had originally committed.

But there is an important message here in terms of the approach that the opposition have taken on this issue, and that is that if the opposition were really serious about the solar industry then they would bring forward a set of policies which showed their support for sustainability, for climate change action and for the solar industry as a whole.

The bottom line here is that on 1 July, under the Rudd Labor government’s Solar Schools Plan, schools will have the opportunity to put solar panels on their roofs. Schools have been waiting for this moment to come, and that is because under the former government’s green vouchers plan they could not do that. They did not have the opportunity to put solar panels on their roofs at all. So in this debate I think we have to ask ourselves: is this commitment of nearly half a billion dollars to schools around Australia—to enable them to put solar hot water systems, solar panels, PV panels, water tanks, water energy-efficiency devices and so on, but particularly solar PV panels on their roofs—going to provide a substantial bedrock for the solar industry to continue to produce solar panels and supply them to schools around Australia? I think the answer to that question must be yes.

Additionally, looking at the great appetite that Australians do have for putting energy-efficiency measures and solar energy into their homes, we will introduce low-interest green loans which, from 2009, will provide families with the opportunity, again, to put solar panels, solar hot water systems and the like on their roofs—another substantial foundation upon which a sustainable Australian solar industry can actually be established.

In relation to the means test on the rebate, what we have said is that we will monitor demand and we will continue to monitor that demand as the program rolls out. That is what I said to Mr May. I thought that was a perfectly reasonable thing to say to him. I acknowledged the point that he put to me and I said, ‘We’ll monitor demand in that program.’ They brought forward their concerns and we listened to them. But, on the subject of means testing, we think it is appropriate for public funds to be directed towards priorities—priorities for the environment, priorities to drive least-cost abatement, priorities for Australians who can least afford significant investments in the up-front costs of solar panels. So what we are looking at here is actually a sustainable solar industry with significant Rudd Labor government support for programs that stretch out from this point onwards and with the capacity for Australians who do not earn more than $100,000 to get those solar panels on their roofs, which is what they want to do—and for an industry to do the job of putting the panels up there for them.

I recognise that some members of the opposition have a different view about economic responsibility and means testing. The Leader of the Opposition said, ‘How do you put a means test on the environment?’ The fact is that the former minister for the environment did put a means test on the environment. He put a means test on solar hot water and it was set at $100,000. The question here is really about how much genuine, substantial policy reform the opposition are going to bring into this House on the matter of climate change and the solar industry in general.

The member for Flinders got up and said he thought I was a nice bloke but he had to tell me what he really thought about me in terms of performance. Well, here is what I would like to say in response to the member for Flinders: the Rudd Labor government brought forward the most comprehensive climate change and environment agenda that we have seen in the federation and we ensured that responsibility for delivering that agenda was given across a range of portfolios to a number of ministers, including me—and I welcome that opportunity.

When my colleague the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Minister Burke, and I as the minister for the environment brought forward the $2.25 billion Caring for Our Country initiative, I felt a great sense of achievement and pride. Why was that? Because we had done three things. Firstly, we had stopped the rorting. We had stopped a decade of rorting by the member for Flinders’s colleagues which saw the Natural Heritage Trust exist as a bucket of funds which could be sent off in all manner of directions with no significant evaluation and no transparency in terms of the delivery and the effectiveness of the programs.

Secondly, we set national priorities. We have got a significant investment in Indigenous protected areas. We are investing $200 million in reef rescue for our great natural treasures like the Great Barrier Reef. Where were the opposition on these issues when they were in government? They were trying to put a shadecloth across the Great Barrier Reef! They were trying to put a shadecloth across the Great Barrier Reef and denying that climate change was going to impact or threaten the reef.

Thirdly, we have brought forward a package of measures in the budget of some $1 billion which provide opportunities for communities and households to take energy-efficiency measures, to take low-interest loans, to have solar panels on the roofs of their schools. This is an initiative and a commitment that will run right across the economy and right across the country. This is serious nation-building on a sustainable basis which sees solar energy playing its proper role and ensures that Australians can have confidence that, when these programs come through, they are actually going to be used effectively—in the instance of the one that we are debating, by those who need to be able to use it and, across the measure of programs that have been identified, by the whole of the Australian community.

It is about having a plan. If you do not have a plan then what you have is a stunt. You cannot have stunt driven debates in the House. I acknowledge the concerns of the solar industry, but you cannot have stunt driven debates in the House; you have to have a plan. You have to have a plan that is going to address the significant climate change challenge that we face.

Let me identify some aspects of our plan. We have heard nothing from the member for Flinders about what the opposition are going to do, except introduce the legislation as a private member’s bill and run it back through the House. Where is the commitment to significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the medium and the long term? Where is the commitment, for example, to phasing out greenhouse intensive hot water systems? That is a commitment that we have made, a commitment which will see significant emission reductions, and the shadow minister knows that. Where is the plan for a renewable energy target? Our renewable energy target is to have 20 per cent of our electricity supply powered by renewable energy by 2020. We had numerous debates in this House about the necessity of supporting the renewable energy industry and now we do not have a policy from the opposition that is about renewable energy at all; we have a policy that is about clean energy. We want to support the renewable energy industry. We want to make sure that the renewable energy industry gets its fair share, and that is what a renewable energy target will do.

Finally, let us look at emissions trading, because it is when emissions trading comes into play that we have a price in the marketplace with wide coverage in a scheme which is rigorously designed to enable the maximum benefits to be taken from low-cost application, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and making sure that it is done on a low-cost basis.

Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Ian Macfarlane interjecting

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are now starting to get interesting interjections across the table. I very much look forward to seeing the policy develop on this question of what should or should not be included in an emissions trading scheme. What I can say is that the Rudd Labor government has approached this issue with consistency, with diligence, with care and with true deliberation. We have the Garnaut review underway, we have the Treasury modelling underway and we have the Wilkins review underway. We have a commitment to ensure that by 2010 there will be an emissions-trading scheme which will drive the economy of this country and make sure that emissions are reduced at low cost. We would have had to wait another two years, from a very reluctant government if they had been elected, for that to happen. We got on with the job. We are serious about climate change and we are serious about enabling the market and market signals to play their role in reducing emissions.

Today we went to the heart of the question of empowering the community to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. I have laid out a significant platform of policy measures that we are bringing into this parliament and that we will take out to the Australian community. It is about responsible economic management. I will go straight to the question of responsible economic management and simply say this: if the solar PV rebate was not means tested, as those opposite are calling for, and if it continued to grow at the current rates, then it would lead to a massive blow-out in the budget. Not only do we have the coalition raiding the surplus already, when we know that it is important to have a surplus and that we need to keep downward pressure on interest rates; but if this program were not means tested then it would simply grow, and at current rates that would lead to a massive blow-out and a blow-out in the budget. If the program continued to grow at current rates, within 12 months the government would be providing approximately more than 8,000 rebates. That is what the opposition is saying. That is a budget blow-out which is really significant. Not only is it significant; it is irresponsible. I put it to the member for Flinders that you cannot seriously be arguing in opposition that you should have a blow-out of this rebate to that extent. I will be very interested to see the private member’s bill when it comes through. Is that what you will be arguing for? If you will be arguing for that then you are actually arguing for an unsustainable program, in current budgetary circumstances, to be maintained.

What we say is: let us cap a rebate to enable the program to be delivered sustainably. That is the economically responsible way to go about delivering this program to Australians who need it most and it is the ecologically responsible way of doing it because it ensures that there is sustainability in the system. We do not have a solar industry that swings from pillar to post. We have a solar industry that has the confidence that we have programs in place that will ensure their long-term viability.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Heritage, the Arts and Indigenous Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to support my colleague the member for Flinders and say that this is a most extraordinary World Environmental Day, when we have had to listen to the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts trying to justify destroying the Australian people’s opportunity and chance to personally do something about greenhouse gas emissions. Australia is blessed with clear skies and an enormous potential for solar energy generation. This technology is not new and it lends itself to uptake by households, by ordinary men and women, as well as, of course, by industry and by institutions like schools and community places.

Ordinary Australians want to save energy. They are aware that Australians are amongst the highest per capita emitters of greenhouse gasses. It is a part of our history and our natural resource capital. But how can Australians do this job when they are stymied completely by the costs of something like solar panels? We the coalition, when in government, wanted to stimulate the Australian community’s investment in solar panels, so we introduced an uncapped non-means tested $8,000 grant to help towards the average outlay of between $15,000 and $20,000 to install solar panels. This program was hugely successful. It tripled demand in the past 12 months, as we have heard. We are proud of that achievement. Australians were proud of that achievement, of the heavy lifting they were doing on behalf of the global greenhouse problem.

Then in a shock announcement—certainly not made known before the election—Labor killed this program. They killed it by means-testing the rebate so that it could only apply to families with a combined pre-tax income less than $100,000. This knocks out about half of our dual-income families. It knocks out over 600,000 households where one parent works full time and one parent works part time. Two people on $50,000—that is below the average income in Australia—will be on the edge of eligibility. But now this Labor government has means tested this very important rebate so that the vast majority of Australians cannot any longer participate in doing something about the fact that we have greenhouse emissions endangering this globe, threatening life as we have known it. Industry and our industry advocates are absolutely appalled at this decision. I will repeat some quotes. Phil May, Co-Director of Solartec Renewables, said:

“They—

the Labor government—

have totally destroyed (the solar industry) absolutely and totally ruined it,” Mr May said.

He said:

In the three days immediately following the budget we lost $360,000 in cancelled orders. This has kicked the guts out of our company.

The Communications Director of the Clean Energy Council said:

People are absolutely frantic. We have had endless calls and emails from members in the last 72 hours and all our phones are running hot. Customers are pulling out in droves. We have been blindsided. The industry was not consulted and the consultation we had was not about this—

‘this’ being means testing the solar panel rebate. As Irena Bukhshtaber of the Clean Energy Council said:

The government has killed the industry stone cold dead.

My colleague the previous speaker made it very clear how this means not just lost business for the industry but also lost jobs, lost training and a lost opportunity to engage in what will become one of the world’s most important industry sectors in the future—renewable energy. It is extremely sad that Australia has lost the opportunity to develop specialists. People in country towns—for example, electricians—were able to develop these skills and provide a service to households that wanted to reduce their energy costs. It is hypocritical, too, when you consider the green loans scheme that Labor has just announced with a means test of $250,000. Why is it $100,000 for solar panels and $250,000 for the green loans scheme? How extraordinary!

Does the government, and particularly the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts, understand the growth in energy use in Australia? You could wonder: is that the problem? Did the Rudd government in deliberating about this not understand what the growth in household energy usage was? I thought perhaps that was the case and he was simply ignorant, but today in Minister Garrett’s press release he says of his amazing three new initiatives:

The announcement coincides with the release of a new report on household energy usage which forecasts an increase in energy usage of 56 per cent by 2020, emphasising the need for immediate, comprehensive and coordinated action on energy efficiency.

Here is the minister quoting that report and yet at the same time he stands up in this parliament today trying to defend the destruction of the solar panel industry. How extraordinary—how can he sleep at night?

The minister said in his speech a moment ago that Labor, and he in particular, ‘would go to the heart’ of helping to address greenhouse gases. But what were the three major new announcements which he said ‘go to the heart’ of helping Australians deal with the problem of increasing energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions? Wait for it. Hold your breath—here it comes. The first major measure was a new television-labelling scheme. Consumers can watch—the Labor government is very keen on watching—their television knowing how much energy it uses. Fantastic! The second major measure—and this is a big breakthrough from the Labor government to save the nation from greenhouse gas emissions—is a new guide to help householders, in particular renovators, identify ways to incorporate energy-saving measures into their homes. There are already two or three dozen of these energy guides, and I hope this new one makes no reference to solar panels, because that would be very cruel. If the new guide listed solar panels as a major way to save energy in your household, then these people—over 50 per cent; over 600,000 homes—will be wasting their time contacting their local solar panel installers, because they would find that they were typically not eligible for the rebate and they could not afford the $15,000 to $20,000.

Wait for the third great cut-through measure, which, as the minister said, ‘went to the heart’ of helping to address greenhouse gas emissions in Australia. I hope you are on the edge of your bench. Here it goes: to accelerate the phase-out of traditional incandescent light globes. There we go. Minister Garrett today said: ‘Don’t worry about solar energy. Don’t worry about all the other problems we have with the environment. On World Environment Day here are our three new killer programs.’

Let us talk about the whole business of what the government is doing in general about addressing the impacts of climate change and greenhouse gas emissions. The minister referred to the wonderful job they are doing with Caring for Our Country. I asked him earlier today during the debate on the appropriations bill: ‘Minister, how can you justify your 20 per cent cut to Landcare?’ Landcare is that 25-year-old program where hundreds of thousands of volunteers in 4,000 separate groups do all the heavy lifting in trying to protect the environment as they battle hotter, drier conditions and more storms. I asked the minister how he was going to help those land carers deal with the 20 per cent cut he has imposed. He said, ‘No worries, it’s not a cut; it’s about a saving—it’s about efficiency.’ Okay, you tell us, Minister, what are you going to cut with Landcare? Whose salaries are you going to reduce, given they are volunteers? Whose picks and shovels and trees are you going to remove now that Landcare will be cut by 20 per cent? Catchment management bodies will be slashed by 40 per cent; environmental stewardship will be gone altogether. The minister who stood here and said he was proud of Caring for Our Country really needs to understand exactly what it was that was read out on his behalf on budget night.

This is an absolutely appalling attack on Australians attempting to deal with climate change and lower their energy consumption through installing solar panels. We had a program that was so successful. We had developed and enlarged a solar panel industry that we believed was going to become world best. What the minister has done is a disgrace. (Time expired)

Jennie George (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was very interested to hear the comments from the earnest member for Flinders trying to chastise the Rudd Labor government for the supposed negative consequences of the introduction of the cap on the solar panel rebate. I must say that when I was listening to the member for Flinders, and knowing his earnestness about the issue of climate change and global warming, it sounded like a case of ‘he doth protest too much’, because the more one heard the more the hypocrisy was so evident.

I notice the member for Flinders is now engaged in very earnest conversation with his colleagues, but I do want to say a little about the history because I think it is very important. We have a group of newly elected members in this parliament and a smiling former minister for industry at the table. I will discuss some of the comments that were made.

What we need to understand is that, for all of the period of the Howard government, there was a decided lack of attention to one of the most serious issues, if not the most serious issue, facing the globe and our nation. It was a decade of inaction, it was a decade of scepticism and it was a decade where earnest members like the member for Flinders must have been mightily embarrassed about the nonsense that we heard from that side of the chamber when they were in government.

Let me just give you a taste of what they were saying. I will share. Just less than a year ago four members of the then Howard government now in opposition—two are still here and they are so surprised they did not all get back—dissented in a parliamentary committee report that was looking at the issue of geosequestration. Do you know the reason for the dissent? The grounds in their dissenting report were that the majority report was, ‘One-sided in assuming climate change was the result of human activity.’ Can you believe that? They said—and the member for Flinders would have been very embarrassed; yes, he looks up very sheepishly—‘Whether human activities are disturbing the climate in dangerous ways has yet to be proven.’ This was a year ago. They went on in the dissenting chapter and used the word ‘fanatics’ to refer to those who believed that human activity caused global warming.

But perhaps the most extraordinary claim in that dissenting report, signed by four members of the backbench of the Howard government, was that evidence of global warming on other planets, such as Mars and Jupiter, made it unreasonable for humans to take pre-emptive action on planet Earth. You have to ask: what planet was the coalition on, what planet did they inhabit then and what planet are they inhabiting today? Quite frankly, the member for Flinders would be well advised to spend his earnest time educating his side of the chamber on the science of global warming, instead of coming in here and reading a litany of sins allegedly committed on this side of the House.

But please do not think it was just backbenchers who did not understand the science of climate change. I see at the table the former minister for industry, the member for Groom. We all recall the impact that Al Gore’s memorable documentary An Inconvenient Truth had on our community. In fact, as I argued previously, community opinion was well ahead of the Howard government. Do you know how the then minister for industry described it? He said it was ‘just entertainment’.

Ian Macfarlane (Groom, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was.

Jennie George (Throsby, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yes, he is nodding. He agrees. I would say to people: go back to the Hansard and see what the then Deputy Prime Minister, Mark Vaile, was saying about the issue along with senior members of cabinet, like the member for Groom, and of course we had ‘poor Malcolm in the middle’. Poor Malcolm in the middle when he was the environment minister was trying to balance the sceptics with those who described themselves, as John Howard did later on, as a ‘climate change realist’ because the community were really quite ahead of him. So Malcolm, in my terminology, then earned the nickname of ‘poor Malcolm in the middle’ on the issue of climate change. But you still come into this House and start lecturing the Rudd Labor government about the commitments we have made on this issue and about the substantial suite of policies that we have to address this very fundamental challenge.

We understand the lessons that were brought home in the Stern report—not acting on climate change would in fact carry extraordinary economic risks, while acting early would open up new economic opportunities. We know on this side of the House that the prospect of transitioning to low-carbon economies has been described by many as the next industrial revolution and opens up huge opportunities.

But then we had the member for Murray coming in here shedding crocodile tears about the supposed loss of jobs. I did not see those crocodile tears when your government refused to raise the MRET target, which was sending companies like Vestas, the wind company in Tasmania, offshore. I did not see the crocodile tears when you refused to ratify Kyoto, which would have given you the option through the clean development mechanism to boost domestic industry and its capabilities internationally.

Did we hear anything when the technology for the solar hot water system developed at the University of Sydney was taken by the Chinese, who saw its huge commercial potential? They grabbed it with open arms and we did nothing. I am not surprised China grabbed it; today it is a huge part of their booming solar market, a market which now accounts for 80 per cent of the world’s new solar hot water installations. Invented in Australia, lost to China, now made in China—one example of the legacy of missed opportunities by a government that failed to realise not only the environmental consequences of dangerous climate change but the economic opportunities that were opened up for us.

Please, Member for Flinders, do not come in lecturing this side of the House about one aspect of a suite of policies. You know yourself, when you were in government, the hard battle people on your side of the House had in ensuring that the solar rebate continued. It was very much at risk and we had environmental groups coming to lobby both sides of the chamber. Our side of the chamber put enormous pressure on your government not to dismantle the solar rebate system. This was at a time when you were losing all the opportunities—no crocodile tears when companies were going offshore because you would not provide the foundations for investment and commercialisation of technologies in the solar sector.

Australia could have been the Silicon Valley of solar energy, but we needed national leadership and we did not get it. I know you are very earnest, Member for Flinders, but I think a lot of your time, effort and energy should be really spent in making sure that members of the opposition are genuinely involved and understand the science of dangerous climate change.

Rudd Labor government members understand, and so does the community that voted for our strong environmental policies, that to protect our future prosperity and to look after our nation for future generations we have to move to a clean energy, low-carbon economy and society, and we are investing substantially. There is the Renewable Energy Fund—$500 million to accelerate the development and commercialisation of renewable technologies in Australia; we have an Energy Innovation Fund; and we have investments not just in solar but also in clean coal technology, in wind and wave power, in geothermal technologies and, very importantly, in carbon capture and sequestration.

So the Rudd Labor government has a very strong commitment to the solar industry. The foundations we have laid in this budget will see a huge spurt of growth opportunities in that industry. If you just take one example, we are looking at the National Solar Schools program. More than 9,000 installations will be involved in that massive national program. I would imagine that that would provide far more employment opportunities than those that were bemoaned today with crocodile tears, when none existed over the decade that these technologies were driven offshore. The outlook for solar and renewable energy remains very, very positive under this government, which has a comprehensive and cohesive strategy for the future. (Time expired)

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The discussion has concluded.