Jan McLucas (Queensland, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing) Share this | Hansard source

The Minister for Resources and Energy brought this bill to parliament with the support of colleagues from the Ministerial Council on Energy to continue our progress toward the creation of an efficient and effective national energy market. By passing the Australian Energy Market Amendment (AEMO and Other Measures) Bill 2009 the Senate will play an important role in facilitating the ministerial council’s cooperative approach to national energy reform. Lead legislation to be enacted in South Australia will see essential functions conferred on the Australian Energy Market Operator. The lead legislation will amend the national electricity law and the national gas law and will then be applied by all remaining jurisdictions, excluding the Northern Territory and Western Australia, through legislation known as the application acts.

AEMO will assume the functions carried out by the Gas Market Company in New South Wales, the National Electricity Market Management Company, the Victorian Energy Networks Corporation, the Gas Retail Market Operator in Queensland and the Retail Energy Market Company in South Australia. The AEMO legislation itself is currently the subject of a rigorous consultation process engaging all relevant stakeholders. The ministerial council’s AEMO Implementation Steering Committee has sought stakeholder comment and will be finalising the legislation in the near future, taking into account this input. The bill that the Senate is considering amends the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Act 2000 and the Trade Practices Act 1974 to replace references to the National Electricity Market Management Company Ltd with the Australian Energy Market Operator Ltd, AEMO. The bill also makes minor amendments to the Australian Energy Market Act 2004, the Administrative Decisions (Judicial Review) Act 1977 and the Trade Practices Act 1974 to ensure that those acts correctly reference Western Australian legislation which will apply to the Commonwealth’s offshore area, with Western Australia adopting elements of the national gas law.

In summary, passage of this bill, which makes minor technical amendments to Commonwealth legislation, will allow the smooth implementation of the cooperative energy reform agenda. This bill has the full support of our state and territory colleagues on the Ministerial Council on Energy and I commend it to the chamber.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.