Simon Birmingham (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Education and Training) Share this | Hansard source

I am not a walking index to the pages and contents of the Finkel report, so I will happily take on notice the aspect of the question that seeks a particular page reference. But the senator did mention the impact of electricity price rises over the period of 2007 to 2016. Of course, there have been many factors there in terms of the retail charges, the wholesale charges and the distribution charges that, at different junctures, have had an impact. The Finkel report does demonstrate that, at present, in terms of some of the price pressures, the generation charges, and particularly the contribution of the peaking of gas prices, is a real factor that the Turnbull government is taking very seriously and working to address.

Equally, if you look at the trajectory of price rises, you can see that, in that time horizon, there was one period where prices, in fact, did dip somewhat. That was the period after the coalition government came to power, took out a carbon tax and put in place other measures to meet our emissions reduction targets—measures that are proving to be successful and reduced the impact of price rises. (Time expired)