Carol Brown (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Tourism) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. I rise to speak on the disallowance of section 7 of these ARENA regulations. Labor have moved the same disallowance, and we will be supporting this motion. Labor are proud that we created the Australian Renewable Energy Agency—ARENA—in 2012 to help support technologies build our future energy system and create jobs for the future. While we invested $2.5 billion in ARENA in 2012, those opposite have tried to undermine, gut and abolish the integrity of ARENA for the past eight years. Labor support the sections of the regulations relating to the 2020 budget measures for programs including freight and industrial efficiency, regional microgrids and future fuels.

These revised regulations include new safeguards on the implementation of those budget measures. This is an omission that Labor and the Senate were right to disallow in the original regulations. However, section 7 of these regulations, attempting to force the Renewable Energy Agency to fund non-renewables, is just the latest in a series of moves by those opposite to undermine the integrity of Australia's climate institutions established by Labor and to circumvent the parliament by attempting to change laws via regulation. The object of the ARENA Act 2011 is to:

(a) improve the competitiveness of renewable energy technologies; and

(b) increase the supply of renewable energy in Australia.

Experts say that funding other technologies would be inconsistent with the object of the act and would likely be subject to legal challenge.

Unlike the Greens, who are ideological about technologies like CCS, Labor supports any new energy technologies where they stack up scientifically and commercially. But deserving non-renewable technologies should be supported in other ways and not be allowed to dilute ARENA's funding and expertise. For example : if the government had wanted to support CCS technologies, it shouldn't have abolished the CCS Flagships program and cut half a billion dollars of funding. We note that the concerns about the potential legality of going beyond the act via the regulation were even shared by the minister's party room colleague who chairs the Liberal-led Standing Committee for the Scrutiny of Delegated Legislation. We also note that the minister had to remake these regulations after a humiliating defeat of the original regulations in the Senate just two months ago.

Labor created ARENA in 2012 and we will always protect it. We will protect it from becoming Mr Angus Taylor's slush fund because it is doing an incredible job, it has maintained its integrity, it has been able to provide jobs for Australians and it has been able to deliver returns on investment for taxpayers. Return on taxpayer investment is not the first thing that comes to mind when Minister Taylor has an idea. For every $1 invested by ARENA, the economy sees $3 leveraged. We want to ensure that the high rate of return continues. We will be supporting this disallowance.