Anne Ruston (SA, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Health and Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

This is just another con by the Labor Party. Today the Labor Party, with their stablemates the Greens, are intending to legislate a lie. The Treasury Laws Amendment (Energy Price Relief Plan) Bill 2022 will not see power prices going down. We know that power prices are only going to go up. Those opposite know that power prices are going up, but they're still prepared to mislead Australians. The opposition have always said we would not stand in the way of constructive, sensible cost-of-living relief to Australians, but this bill does not deliver that.

Today we're going to see this bill shoved through this place because those opposite simply do not know the answers to the questions that they would have been asked had we been able to have an appropriate length of time to prosecute all of the very substantial issues that sit behind this bill. Instead, they haven't come in here and answered questions about who is going to be eligible for the payment, how much they will be eligible for, what small businesses will be able to get access to, who's going to miss out when demand exceeds supply and whose power is going to be cut off. Where's the modelling to show that energy prices are actually going to go down? Clearly, there isn't any, because we know they are going up.

Most importantly, we would like to know from the government opposite and their colleagues the Greens: What are you going to say to the Australian public when your disastrous interventions into the gas market mean that prices go up and Australians' power bills go up at the same time? Most concerningly, what are you going to say to Australians when the lights go out?

The contempt for this parliament shown by those opposite meant we didn't get the legislation in its final form until 8.45 last night. How on earth is anybody supposed to prosecute the details of legislation in that time frame? They've had six months to deliver an energy policy. What they've done at the eleventh hour is recall the parliament, at great expense to taxpayers. That includes flying people in from overseas. I'd like to know who's footing the bill for them flying in those of their colleagues who are overseas.