Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I will just conclude. I find it remarkable that this government wants to hand out $5 billion to the fossil-fuel and other very large damaging infrastructure sectors with virtually no transparency, with no requirement for a cost-benefit analysis, with no requirement for the principles of ESD to be considered and with no care that in fact the federal government might not even have the ability to approve or refuse such a project under environmental laws in future. Yet at the same time you have the audacity to hold up the Clean Energy Finance Corporation as the model, a model that—through you, Chair—you and your government have been trying to tear down since you formed government. Suddenly it is a paragon of a model of how we should be doing things. We know that, so why were you attacking it for so many years? We welcome that you now are adopting the model, but it is ironic that you want to give free money out to fossil fuels with absolutely no checks and balances. Again, it speaks volumes about the priorities of this government.