Alex Antic (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Well, you need to catch up then, Senator Scarr. I will take that interjection. We are now leading the pack on that dubious honour of having the highest power prices in the country. We in South Australia are also one of the earliest adopters of renewable power—the home of the September 2016 blackout, the blackout that stopped the nation. It stopped the state, anyway. We know that for sure.

In any event, South Australian small businesses, as reported in the Adelaide Advertiser article, are now pay more for the electricity than anywhere else in the country. As the article notes, SA businesses forked out $8,490 in the year to April on electricity—the highest in the nation—while, for example, Victorian counterparts, who also have a Labor government but less of a reliance on renewables, paid $5,480. Gas bills in South Australia have also risen at the fastest rate anywhere in the country.

We are now a Labor-led economic basket case. The worst part of it is that it will only get worse because we have at least two more years or dual Labor governments.