Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the explanation.

Whilst I am interested, as most people in the chamber are, in what the government is doing in recent initiatives, the point at issue here is that Senator Ian Campbell made a statement to the Canberra Times that the Australian government had committed $144 million over the past four years, to 2 June this year, through the Australian Research Council to 216 research projects associated with solar energy. The problem is that absolutely nobody I have spoken to in the solar industry can identify these 216 research projects that had supposedly been funded to that extent over the past four years. In fact, with all this discussion about investment in renewable and low-emission technologies, the vast and overwhelming majority of the funding goes to the coal industry for carbon capture and storage and coal to liquids, and in terms of transport fuels and energy the funding is going overwhelmingly to the oil companies.

I specifically asked Senator Campbell to tell me where these 216 research projects are, what their names are and how they account for the $144 million. It has been 72 days and I still do not have an answer to that question, and I look forward to Senator Campbell providing that kind of detail. What we have got is a whole lot of statements about how much the government love solar energy and how much they are doing, but we cannot find the detail. I was alarmed when I received Senator Ian Campbell’s handwritten note that said that this information is on the website. I hope that I am not just going to get a note in the next few days saying, ‘I refer you to the website.’ I do not want to be referred to a website. I have asked a specific question on the specific projects and on how much money they have received over the last four years. I look forward to Senator Campbell providing the list of projects and the amount of money for each one.

I am making this kind of stand because earlier this week, as the senator mentioned, he stood up and made a big announcement about his solar project at AP6. What he did not say was that the Commonwealth allocated $100 million in January this year to low-emissions technologies and it turned out that, of that $100 million, only $25 million was to be for renewables. That is a quarter of it.