Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Families and Social Services) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Senator Waters, for your question. First and foremost, the government, the Morrison-McCormack government, is absolutely committed to working with the Australian public to make sure we have an energy mix in this country that is reliable and affordable, but, at the same time, that we meet our international obligations as well as protecting our environment. We actually believe that we can do all of those things at the same time.

You refer to a number of projects. As an example, the project offshore in Victoria that you are referring to—clearly we already have independent regulators that have processes in place in which to assess, to make sure, that any project that is undertaken in our amazing Australian environment is protected in the process, but we also have resources that are owned by the Australian people. These resources are for the benefit of all Australians. As long as they are extracted in a mechanism and a manner in which the environment is protected then every Australian deserves to be able to benefit from the benefits of being able to get access to those resources.

In the case of the Victorian offshore program that you are referring to, of course NOPSEMA is the independent regulator and they will make sure they go through their robust and independent processes to make sure that any exploration, which is what you are referring to, that is undertaken is undertaken in a manner that is consistent with the protection of Australia's environment. We have been very clear as a government that we believe that we have multiple obligations. We have an obligation to the Australian public for cheap, reliable and accessible power, but we also have an obligation to our international requirement on carbon emissions. And we have an obligation to make sure that we protect our environment, our very precious environment, but we will do so in a manner in which we can extract the resources that are the proprietary property of all Australians, and all Australians deserve to benefit from them.