Linda Reynolds (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

As a very proud West Australian senator, it is absolutely shocking what those opposites are doing in relation to the gas policy for this nation. Not only are they exploiting and paying the environmental defenders offices to do their dirty work for them, but we've seen in question time alone just how dirty that work is.

But I am very proud to say that gas is good. In fact, gas is great, and those opposites speak with terribly forked tongues. You have the minister for minerals and energy in Western Australia saying how good it is, how important it is, but they do not back it up with action. Natural gas is a vital part of the energy mix, and the energy transition, over time, to net zero or zero energy. Government must not just say, on one side of the country, that we need gas. Whatever your view on the energy market going forward, whether you support nuclear energy or you want a heavier load of renewables, gas is essential. It is still going to be essential for decades and decades to come, so let's just have a look at the hypocrisy of those opposite.

Now, it's not just me who thinks gas is good. Reece Whitby is the Western Australian Labor environment minister who gave the approval in Western Australia last year—after six years, mind you. They had to start the review process over again because a bureaucrat left. It took them six years to approve it. The Western Australian Labor state minister said that gas is the enabler of renewables, especially in Western Australia. If you want to use renewables, you must have gas. The whole of Western Australia is essentially powered by gas. It runs all of our industries. All jobs in Western Australia—tens if not hundreds of thousands of jobs in mining, manufacturing and mineral processing—are powered by gas, and they will continue to be so for decades to come.

While gas is poured out of Western Australia, investment and jobs have poured in, not just into the gas sector itself but also into all of the enabling industries in Western Australia. But the North West Shelf does need to be extended—in fact, out to 2070. It has had six years so far. As Meg O'Neill, the amazing CEO of Woodside, has said:

We have a plant. We're not changing the fence line, we're not changing the stuff that's inside the plant. If anything we're going to be improving the emissions performance.

It took six years for the Labor government in Western Australia to finally come to the conclusion that gas is good and necessary. She said that it was baffling. And now we come to the federal environment minister. She's got to get the report on the project from her department by the end of this month, but I'll bet you anything she ain't going to make a decision on this before the federal election. And why? It is because their partners in environmental and economic crimes, the Greens, will absolutely go mad at them—we've heard them.

So what do we need to do from here? In fact, I might put it this way: Tanya Plibersek, the Minister for the Environment and Water, has a decision to make. We are running out of gas in Western Australia. There are three new projects, which will feed into the existing infrastructure. They will bring in $30 billion of investment and will provide Western Australia with the gas security that it needs. Of course, gas is far cleaner than coal, which is why it is so necessary for the transition. But I say this to Tanya Plibersek: you approved the environmental vandalism of the Perth Hills—the destruction of 60,000 trees to make way for a property developer's high-density housing development in the Perth Hills in the middle of the most fire-prone area of Western Australia.

Question agreed to.