Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Patrick for his question. Gas prices have fallen this year, compared to last, across the Australian east coast. Indeed, right now, I'm advised that the gas price in Wallumbilla, which is a hub for gas prices in Australia, near Roma, is $8.55 a gigajoule. That compares to the price when it peaked, in February last year, of $12.49 a gigajoule. It's a reduction of 22½ per cent over that period.

In saying that, Senator Patrick is correct that in the past few months, as outlined in the report he indicated, there has been upward pressure on oil and gas prices around the world, and that, of course, has flowed through to Australia as well. Largely, that's as a result of factors outside the federal government's control, of course. It's around the decisions of OPEC and issues around sanctions in Iran.

More recently, however, we have seen reductions of oil prices and gas prices in North Asia that have started to flow through to the Australian market. More importantly for us now, what the agreement we've got with gas producers is meant to do is make sure that Australian consumers and Australian manufacturers have access to Australian gas first, which they do now. That will ensure that prices here in Australia do not go above those overseas, as they did early last year, before the government acted. That is the case right now. Right now, the gas price at Wallumbilla, as I quoted before, is about $2 a gigajoule lower than prices prevailing in Asia—a huge turnaround from the situation that existed early last year. Indeed, that is also reflected in the gas that is being delivered from Queensland coal seam gas fields to the rest of the market. For the last 12 months, around 100 petajoules—around a fifth of the east coast market—has flowed from Queensland to other markets, when early last year there was a net outflow from Queensland compared to the rest of the country.