James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Government Waste Reduction) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to welcome the important body of work undertaken by Frontier Economics and recently released by the shadow minister for climate change and energy. It's a very important contribution to public policy and, frankly, something that is also highly alarming and concerning because what it has revealed is that the current government's plans for this country's energy generation into the future, which they claim would cost a little over $100 billion, will in fact cost more than $600 billion—thanks to this independent analysis from Frontier Economics. We welcome that important clarification, and that is on the record and is not being disputed in any academic, significant or scientific way by anyone that knows anything about this topic.

In fact, Frontier Economics have quite a heritage in working for Labor governments, and they are very highly respected by those Labor governments. Mr Danny Price, the founder of Frontier Economics, is a very consistent adviser to the South Australian Labor government, in my home state. Both former premier Jay Weatherill and current premier Peter Malinauskas have engaged him to undertake major analysis and consultations for them when they've been undertaking significant policy development related to energy. So it's no surprise to me, given Danny Price is such a consistent adviser to Peter Malinauskas, that the current premier is such a consistent advocate for nuclear. Indeed, it was just a few months ago that Premier Peter Malinauskas made this important point:

I'm okay with the presence of a nuclear industry within our country and I mean more broadly, I actually firmly believe that nuclear power is a necessary part of the global energy mix if we're going to achieve net zero.

And the Labor Premier of South Australia, Peter Malinauskas, is not a Johnny-come-lately to this debate, either. In fact, before he was in the parliament, he was a very consistent advocate for nuclear energy in this country. When he was the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Association state secretary—this is back in 2014—he said the following:

I believe climate change is a real challenge we need to face up to, and nuclear energy can be a safe source of base load power, with zero carbon emissions. Thus, I find it contradictory and irresponsible when I see the Greens and environmentalists outright opposing nuclear power.

That's the view of the Labor Party in my home state of South Australia. Whilst I don't make a habit of agreeing with the South Australian Labor government, I do on this issue. Peter Malinauskas is quite right; we do need nuclear power in this country. It's a vital part of securing our energy security into the future, and I commend him for his bravery in standing up to Anthony Albanese and his petty opposition to nuclear.