Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Environment, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Hansard source

It was repeated 97 times in the lead-up to the election. That repetition makes me think that it was a pretty important thing for the then opposition, now government, to speak about. That number, 275, was a promise that the Labor Party made to the people of Australia in order to get their votes to win government. In fact, given they won the election, I would see that as a contract between the government and the people of Australia that voted for them on that basis. People rightly believed the Labor Party when they said, 'We will reduce your power bills by $275.' That number was repeated 97 times, as Senator Cash pointed out earlier on.

But since the election was held, since the ministry was sworn in and since the Prime Minister moved into the Lodge and has spent a lot of time talking to his international counterparts, they have not once said that number—not one minister and not one backbencher. Not in the other place and not here has a single Labor member of parliament referenced that number—275.

We're left thinking, 'Why?' I'll tell you why: it was a broken promise. They told Australians they would reduce power bills by $275. They were clear: there were no terms and conditions and no need to read the fine print. It was as clear as day for every single Australian every time the Prime Minister said, 97 times, 'This is what will happen if you vote for us.' Accordingly, they did vote for them and they expected this reduction in power bills.

It's important to point this out, because you often hear the now government say, 'Things have changed since we made those promises—the war in Ukraine.' It's a terrible event and something we all condemn and wish would end for the sake of those people who are being so tormented by this and whose lives are being destroyed, but the Labor Party made that commitment a further 27 times after the commencement of that conflict. You can't hide behind that as a reason not to deliver on a promise. Not only is it a broken promise; we've gone in the other direction.

What is actually happening here when it comes to Australian power prices? The budget said it all: electricity prices would be skyrocketing by 56 per cent, and household budgets, something we all have to try and deal with, are going to go up. The government's own budget spells that out clearly. They also said gas prices would be going up by 44 per cent.

Here we are, six months on from the election—the election at which that promise I've already referenced a couple of times was made—and there is no plan. But what we have got now is a hastily cobbled together piece of legislation which will not do what the government says it will do. It will not deliver power price relief for Australians in the way that the government suggests it will. Most importantly, it will not deliver on their election commitment. There is no way that that promise of $275, which they made just a few short months ago—so clearly and so often—will be delivered at all.

This has been cobbled together in the worst of ways, and I wonder what process has been gone through to develop this legislation. What were they thinking? Who were they talking to? What was the end outcome they wanted? Was it all about optics? Was it about the stunt of recalling parliament to try and mislead Australians into thinking that all of their energy price woes were going to be resolved by this bill? Was it about that, or was it about genuinely helping Australians?

The fact is that we as an opposition only received this bill, which was so hastily put together, at roughly 8.45 pm yesterday. There was little more than 12 hours between when the opposition received the bill and when debate commenced in the other place. Twelve hours is not a great deal of time to consider some of the most extreme interventions in the energy market we've seen in decades, and I honestly can't understand what they were thinking.

A couple of points have been made with regard to process already. I was listening before to Senator Cash's quite timely contribution about how important the role of this parliament is. Indeed, in the other place, the then Manager of Opposition Business, now Leader of the House, Mr Burke, made very similar points in relation to this, saying:

There is a process that happens with legislation that I have to say does matter. It does matter that members have the opportunity to read legislation …

Well, unless colleagues were staying up all night to then be able to convene as a Senate today to rush this piece of legislation through, without giving it due regard, due interrogation or due scrutiny, that process that was so important in opposition now apparently doesn't matter at all. Senator Cash had it right, because what we're seeing is a government, in this brave new world of the Labor Party, that before the election talked a lot about transparency, scrutiny and the role of parliament but that, in partnership with the Greens, is now expecting this chamber just to rubber-stamp things on false debates. As I say, if there's nothing to hide and nothing to worry about, I'm not sure why we're finishing the debate at 4.30 today and why we couldn't go just a little bit longer and allow those colleagues of mine who wanted to make contributions in the second reading debate and put perspectives from the communities they represent on record to do so. Why wasn't that allowed to happen?

Anyway, here we are, with a costly recall of the parliament to pass this bill, which has been so shambolically put together and will not achieve the intended aims that the government says exist with this legislation. We also have a deal that's been done with the Australian Greens, which we're not going to be able to actually get the details of before we vote on this legislation. Again, where's the transparency? What's to hide? Perhaps we will hear some details about exactly what will happen in the next budget that has been agreed to here by the Australian Greens. Of course, to that end I can indicate that there will be an amendment moved by me on that particular issue.

I will make the point as well, of course, that we do support targeted relief for Australian households and Australian businesses—relief from cost-of-living increases that actually works and will deliver reductions in power bills and in the cost of fuel, food and all of the other essentials that households and businesses need. I foreshadow as well that we have an amendment in the committee stage that goes to separating out the part of the bill that colleagues in the other place have indicated we would support in order to provide relief to Australian households and businesses, but not the other extreme interventionist components of this bill. This bill isn't targeted relief that will work.

As I said before, the government broke a promise about delivering a $275 power price reduction, quite blatantly. I will lay down the challenge now for the minister in her summing-up speech to reference that figure. Let's see if there can at least be a reference to $275. Maybe we're on the pathway to delivering that for Australian households, or maybe, as I suspect, we won't hear those numbers pass the lips of a minister in this government ever again. That promise was broken, and they're now promising that this bill before us today will bring down the cost of power. It won't do that. This bill will not do that, and we know it won't do that. This will be another broken promise.

The real test here is this: when Australian households and businesses open up their next power bill or gas bill, let's see whether the prices have gone up or down from the last one. That is the metric against which Australians will judge what this government has done. And it is the metric against which the government will need to go and explain themselves to Australian people about the promise they made 97 times—clearly, without equivocation—and then failed to deliver, deliberately broke. That's the test.

As I said, it's not just going to be homes. It's also going to be businesses. It's going to be the job generators out there across regional Australia, downtown cities like Melbourne and Sydney and places where manufacturing occurs—energy-intensive businesses which, when power prices go up, are going to rein in costs and are going to sack people. We're going to see jobs going overseas, where it's cheaper to do business and to purchase power to manufacture the goods we should be manufacturing here. If we're interested in looking after our environment, those emissions will be generated elsewhere. This is not going to help anyone. It won't help the economy, it won't help households and it won't help businesses. It will not bring down the cost of living. It will not even help the environment.

Still, here we have higher power prices and we have a government ignoring a very basic principle of economics, the law of supply and demand—the need to bring on supply to reduce pressures on what we have already in place. We only have to look at the comments of people like the Reserve Bank governor, the Secretary of the Treasury and any other energy market expert, who've all made it very clear that the answer to the energy crisis—which this bill purports to drive a silver bullet through—is bringing more supply on. The lack of supply drives up prices.

A point that's been made before, and it's a very important one for Australians to understand, is that you can't switch off the old system without switching on the new. We don't have a new system. We cannot just, in the blink of an eye, replace what we need in terms of energy consumption. We cannot just switch across to some ethereal new energy generation source when we switch off coal and gas. But that's what this government is seeking to do, and the end result is going to be disastrous. It will be higher power prices, not lower ones. It won't be $275 off your power bill, as promised just six months ago. It'll be something far in the opposite direction.

As I said, the Labor Party—all of their ministers and all of their backbenchers—refuse to reference those numbers. So I hope today in passing this legislation—given they've stitched up the numbers in their secret deal with the Greens and others—