Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party) Share this | Hansard source

The government continue to play politics with our energy system, and all Australians are paying the price for the government's failure to deliver the cheap electricity they promised at the last election. At the last election, the Prime Minister infamously said almost 100 times that he would lower people's power prices by $275 a year. Of course, the opposite has happened, as everybody knows when their power bill turns up. The average power bill has gone up by more than $500 a year since this government took over.

Today, though, we've got a new perspective on how the government have corrupted our whole energy policymaking process to suit their political needs, not the desperate cost-of-living needs of average Australians. Right now, there's another climate change conference going on in Baku in Azerbaijan. Over there, Australia has been invited by the UK and America to join a new agreement to develop advanced nuclear technologies that could deliver energy needs for the world in a low-emissions format. We have traditionally cooperated on nuclear energy initiatives around the world. It's true that nuclear energy is not a technology allowed under existing Australian law, but we do have a world-class nuclear reactor facility in the middle of Sydney, 30 kilometres from the CBD at a place called Lucas Heights. We lead the world in the production of nuclear medicines, and we have some of the best nuclear scientist in the world thanks to that facility. For example, we have been involved, predating this agreement, in the Generation IV forum that is trying to develop new nuclear technologies—so-called gen 4 technologies. We've been an active participant in that process thanks to the world-class nuclear scientists we have in this country.

The government now, by refusing this overture—from our friends and allies in the UK and the US, mind you—is putting at risk that whole reputation of nuclear science we've built up over more than 60 years of operations at Lucas Heights. It is threatening our national security. It's not just an energy security issue now, although energy security is always a national security question. But it directly affects our national security if we distance ourselves from our friends and allies just to serve the domestic political needs of this desperate government trying to hang onto power. There is no justification for Australia not to join this forum. Joining this forum does not in any way necessitate that Australia change its law. It doesn't necessitate us building nuclear power plants. It would continue exactly the same arrangements we've had, such as the Generation IV International Forum we've been involved in for many years. The only rationale you can take from the government's decisions—from Chris Bowen's pigheaded decision to refuse entry to this agreement—is that they don't want to do this because it would be embarrassing for their political purposes here in Australia. Minister Bowen has been quoted as saying that he can't join the agreement because nuclear energy is outlawed in Australia. He may be right about that, but the fact is that, by Mr Bowen putting himself outside this agreement, he has left Australia isolated from our international partners and friends in a way that is completely and utterly unnecessary.

I think even a government against building nuclear energy in this country should join this agreement, because it's right for our national interests to do so. It also demonstrates the bankruptcy of the government's energy policy. They won't even bother looking at nuclear. They refuse to consider nuclear energy in the most juvenile and amateur way, posting pictures of three-eyed fish and all this rubbish. It's just an insult to the intelligence of Australians. I think Australians are a lot more savvy than the government gives them credit for about these ridiculous scare tactics. The minister last year posted on X—or Twitter, at the time—AI-generated footage of radioactive waste barrels. They were rusty, yellow barrels. It was the most puerile thing you could see. It's an embarrassment to our country to be acting like that when nuclear energy is used by so many of our friends and allies. But the government has got its blinkers on here. It's got its blindfold on. It is blind to the pain it has caused to Australians by not lowering their power bills, and it's blind to thinking about any alternative way to change tack and think: 'Okay, we might not have got this right. Let's do something different.' Instead, they are cratering us into an economic disaster by keeping energy prices high.