Anthony Chisholm (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I think it is always illuminating when you have people like Senator Duniam happy to spend so long talking about the broad church within the Liberal-National party to justify their actions. I think that just gives us an illustration of how toxic this debate is within the LNP. I know they have to rush off soon to go to another party room meeting to try to resolve this issue.

When I saw the release of the Finkel report on Friday it gave me the opportunity to think about the last 10 years and the direction of climate policy and energy policy in this country over that time. I had the opportunity to reflect on the 2007 federal election year. During that time I was working in the office of the then Leader of the Opposition, Kevin Rudd. The interesting thing from that time, going back to that 2007 year, is how both parties took to that election a form of emissions trading scheme. I know that Senator Brandis was not that influential during the Howard prime ministership, but it is a fact that both the government and the opposition took an emissions trading scheme to that election campaign.

Sure, the Labor Party's scheme was more ambitious than the one of those opposite; but both did take a bipartisan scheme, in a sense. If you think about where we are now, where we are still arguing over reaching some sort of level of compromise on energy policy and the debilitating impact that has had on jobs, on prices, or communities and on investment—there are a whole range of things—it really is important that we do try to reach compromise with the government.

I also reflect on 2007, that I was with Kevin Rudd when he made that announcement. My recollection of it is that he actually made that announcement at the Townsville State High School, which, to the best of my knowledge, is about two kilometres from where the Adani headquarters will be in Townsville. But that is an issue that I will tackle on another day.

When we look at the politics of this, there is no doubt that what we have seen is the debilitating impact this has on those opposite. Senator Brandis did his best, as he always does, to paper over those cracks. But we know that they have had the discussion this morning and that they are going to have another discussion about this soon in their party room as they try to find common ground within their show about reaching compromise with regard to tackling these issues that we have seen having such a big impact here in Australia.

You know it is bad when you look at the commentary, for instance, from the CEO of the Australian Energy Council. This was used in question time today:

Right now, we couldn't do it worse if we tried. We're making everything worse. We're making prices higher, reliability more unreliable, and we're not delivering the emissions we're required to deliver.

This is the result of what we have seen from the actions of this government. The best example of the wrecking that they have done in regard to providing certainty to those who want to invest—and Senator Paterson talked about this—is when you look at the investment in renewable energies that we have seen under this government. That has completely crashed as a result of their policies and their going to war with renewable energy in this country. It has been absolutely disgraceful. We have also seen this dominating as a hot topic within the coalition, and we know that leads to leadership uncertainty. That is what is playing out in this debate, and unfortunately the people of Australia have been the losers in this regard.

Labor is committed to finding a solution to the energy crisis that has engulfed this country. As the Leader of the Opposition has pointed out, we are keen to work with the coalition where possible to find common ground. What we have seen is that, as a result of the investment strike in new generation, particularly in renewable energy, caused by policy from those opposite, wholesale power prices have doubled under the Turnbull government. This government has actually achieved rare outcomes: power prices are up, pollution is up and jobs are down. The closure of Hazelwood power station and the impact that that is going to have on that community are absolutely devastating. If I had one significant criticism of the Finkel report, it would be that it was not strong enough in recommending a just transition for those workers. That is something that I will have more to say about at the appropriate time. Clearly, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull needs to stare down Tony Abbott and the climate change deniers and back a plan for more renewables in this country.

Question agreed to.