Rex Patrick (SA, Centre Alliance) Share this | Hansard source

I have heard what's been said in the chamber over the last 10 or 15 minutes. I'll explain to you what has happened. Senator Cormann came down to Adelaide a few weeks ago and had a bit of a chat to us about things that were of concern to us. We raised a number of issues, one of which was energy prices. That won't be surprising to Senator Wong; she knows that electricity prices in South Australia are the highest in the country. Senator Cormann then invited me to come across to Western Australia to sit down with Senator Canavan, which I did. We started talking about ways in which gas prices in this country could be brought down. Senator Canavan brought to the table a whole range of things that he was already working on. We talked about a number of things that we thought would be useful. We've had a dialogue backwards and forwards. It turns out some of the things that we thought might be useful can't be implemented because it wouldn't be lawful to do so, and some of the things that we have suggested be done can't technically be achieved; they don't actually give you the outcome that you want.

We've had a running dialogue with the government over the last three or four weeks, going backwards and forwards, having conversations about the details. At the moment—and I'm sure Senator Cormann will confirm this—they have a draft outline of how they want to approach things. It's not fully developed. As Senator Wong would know, having been a minister in government, tabling something or producing something that is not completed can actually be harmful. The government is still working through a whole range of options, and it needs to do a whole bunch of checking-off on those options. We have an understanding of where they want to go, and we also have an invitation—