Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Climate Change and Water (Senator Wong) to questions without notice asked today.

Senator Wong this afternoon had an immediate opportunity to make a statement that would have immediate impact upon the state and the health of the Murray-Darling Basin system, and Senator Wong copped out yet again. It is very difficult to get any sort of an answer from Senator Wong to questions we ask in this chamber. But today she was given the opportunity of demonstrating that the Labor government could do something definitive to help the environmental health of the Murray-Darling Basin system.

There is only 13 per cent capacity in Eildon Dam at the moment—the dam on the Goulburn River, which is part of Murray-Darling Basin system. The Labor government in Victoria, because it has been completely neglectful of any alternative water supplies for Melbourne is now attempting to pinch that water from the environmental reserves in the Eildon Dam and to feed it into Melbourne, where it will water gardens and flush toilets of the citizens of Melbourne. They are doing that because they have been remiss in not providing sufficient other sources of water over many, many years.

This panic attack by the Victorian Labor government on these environmental reserves in the Murray-Darling Basin system should be stopped, and it can be stopped by the Commonwealth government—by Senator Wong and Mr Garrett—by refusing EPBC Act approval for the north-south pipeline, which is proposed to take water from the Murray-Darling Basin system over the range and into Melbourne. Senator Wong today had the classic opportunity to make a difference to the environmental health of the Murray-Darling Basin system, and she squibbed on it.

Senator Wong was also asked by my colleague Senator Kemp about the number of what she called ‘millionaires’ who would no longer be able to access the solar panel rebate that the Howard government had initiated. Senator Wong must know, and Mr Garrett must know, of the number of cancellations since budget night of contracts to install solar hot water panels. In Townsville on the day after the budget my office was inundated with approaches from those who install solar panels with evidence as to the number of cancellations of contracts by people who earn $100,000, $115,000 or $120,000—not millionaires, as Senator Wong called them yesterday, but ordinary average families. There was a plumber, whose partner is a schoolteacher. They would be earning a little over $100,000. They are the sort of people that wanted to do their bit for the environment by having solar panels installed. But, as a result of the Labor government’s budget and a commitment requirement that was not mentioned prior to the election, Labor have installed a means test which makes it impossible for those earning just over $100,000 to have these panels installed. I want to again make the point that people earning $102,000 are not the millionaires that Senator Wong was speaking about. She should know a millionaire when she sees one as her leader is a millionaire, so Senator Wong should be able to identify millionaires. People earning $102,000 are certainly not millionaires and should be entitled to avail themselves of the subsidy, the solar panel rebate.

On every front in the six months that Labor have been in power they have shown themselves not to be friends of the environment. In fact, they have been acting very much in reverse. They have destroyed many of the initiatives of the previous government that made a difference to the environment through the programs that we had.