David Leyonhjelm (NSW, Liberal Democratic Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I inform the Senate that at 8.30 am today, five proposals were received in accordance with standing order 75. The question of which proposal would be submitted to the Senate was determined by lot. As a result, I inform the Senate that following letter has been received from Senator Siewert:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

'The link between the government's collapse in public support and their hostility towards clean energy, their delusional pro-coal agenda, and their steadfast refusal to embrace progress.'

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today's debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Peter Whish-Wilson (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Reflect on question time today, where a number of questions were put to the government to provide details on their NEG; their new energy policy. It is a policy, may I say, that's taken the Liberal National Party nearly five years to arrive at—five years to arrive at this. That's the big question that they won't answer and it's probably the question that they can't answer. But we can. We got this policy this week—this National Energy Guarantee—because Mr Tony Abbott, our ex-Prime Minister, gave a speech last week and ignited the culture wars within the LNP by talking about offering goats to volcanos and how climate change was rubbish. That is why we got a policy from our current Prime Minister, Mr Turnbull, this week. It is a policy that is so vague on details that it beggars belief.

After five years, Attorney-General Brandis told us today that the experts tell us all we need to know. They tell us that it will provide energy supply guarantees, reliability, lower prices and lower emissions, and even meet our Paris Agreement commitments. If this policy is so good and it's so obviously the solution in front of us, why has it taken five years for the government to deliver it to this place?

I'll tell you why: this is a half-arsed policy designed to save Mr Malcolm Turnbull's political bacon. This is not designed to provide reliable power. This is not designed to provide cheaper power. This is not designed to lower emissions. This policy is a compromise with the far right in the LNP led by Mr Tony Abbott—and, may I say, don't stop there. That's still quite a shallow interpretation, because Mr Tony Abbott and the far right, and our friends in the National Party, have been running a pro-coal agenda, an agenda to subsidise coal to keep dirty, uneconomic coal-fired power stations going for another reason. If you'd gone out and listened to the One Nation press conference the other day, you'd have seen what that reason was. This half-arsed energy policy won't meet our Paris Agreement commitments and that will increase uncertainty in the long-term investment horizons that are necessary for us to continue to roll out renewable energy, something that we know is popular in Australia. We know it will create jobs. We know it will reduce emissions. But that doesn't matter. This is actually about solving a political problem for Mr Malcolm Turnbull.

Don't just take it from me. An excellent article in The Conversation today by John Quiggin, professor in the School of Economics at the University of Queensland, said:

The most important thing to understand about the federal government’s new National Energy Guarantee is that it is designed not to produce a sustainable and reliable electricity supply system for the future, but to meet purely political objectives for the current term of parliament.

Those political objectives are: to provide a point of policy difference with the Labor Party; to meet the demands of the government’s backbench to provide support for coal-fired electricity; and to be seen to be acting to hold power prices down.

It really makes me sad, angry and frustrated after my party has been campaigning in here for 10 years to get a proper policy to tackle climate change, which is a price on carbon. Even the Grattan Institute, which has been fairly glowing in its support for this policy, this NEG, said this morning that a price on carbon is the best policy, that this is second rate and that, in fact, there would be no need for emissions intensity guarantees or reliability guarantees if we had a price on carbon. We brought that in nearly 10 years ago. We campaigned and we got it legislated after 2010—gold standard, the world's best climate package, with a price on carbon and money allocated to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, ARENA and the Climate Council to drive innovation and investment in renewable energy. We were on our way. We were on our way to do more than meeting our Paris targets. We were global leaders in action on climate. How sad and embarrassing that we have slumped to where we are today!

For five years we've had policy chaos. We've had uncertainty in business investment. Even the coal-fired power companies have been calling for the government to get its act together. But it took a speech from Mr Tony Abbott to trigger this policy that we have before us today. Well, we are going to need detail. We're going to need detail on how the emissions intensity scheme within this is going to meet our Paris Agreement commitments. We are going to need detail on how the NEG is going to be integrated into our NEM, our wholesale network, and how Western Australia and the Northern Territory are going to be brought under this scheme. We're going to need details.

It's just not good enough that the government would come out with such a big policy announcement with absolutely no detail on how it is going to work. That's not going to solve the problems with business uncertainty on investment. And we're going to need details on how we're going to meet our Paris Agreement commitments when we go back to the COP21 negotiations and the global economies agree on the further cuts in emissions, the reductions, that are necessary to tackle dangerous global warming. And we have got this half-arsed, half-baked policy in front of us here today. It's just not good enough. It's not good enough for future generations of Australians. We should do better.

James Paterson (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Greens' matter of public importance today is:

The link between the Government's collapse in public support and their hostility towards clean energy, their delusional pro-coal agenda, and their steadfast refusal to embrace progress.

My favourite thing about the Greens' MPI today is not their typical economic illiteracy; it's not their expected over-the-top environmental ideology; it's not even their antihuman, antitechnology lunacy. It's the fact that the Greens, who normally confine themselves to providing policy advice to the government, through this chamber and elsewhere, have now decided that they want to get into the business of providing political advice to the government. Not content with their unsuccessful attempts to try and influence the government's policy agenda, they're now trying to teach us a thing or two about politics.

I'm a little bit surprised by this, because presumably what the Greens want us to do, and what they think is to the government's political benefit, is adopt their environmental policies and their economic policies, and, presumably—given that they think that our current policies have led to a collapse in public support—they think that that public support would soon return and we would soon receive a boost in the polls. There is just one little unfortunate fact about the Greens and the political advice that they offer us, and that is that, presumably, if we were offering the policies of the Greens, we would receive the same amount of political support the Greens do. In the most recent Newspoll, published on Monday, the coalition's primary vote was recorded at 36 per cent. To be sure, all coalition members would like that number to be higher. But also on Monday in the Newspoll, the Greens' primary vote was recorded at 10 per cent. So a political party with a 10 per cent support in the polls is offering political advice to a party with more than three times its political support in the polls. I don't think that the government will be rushing to take up the Greens' political advice.

They shouldn't be disappointed, though, because, in a funny way, the government is following the Greens' policy advice for once. We've listened to them very carefully and to all they have said on energy policy, particularly on the merits of renewable energy. We've taken them at their word, and we've gone to the only possible logical conclusion from their advice. Their advice has come in the form of comments such as this by Adam Bandt in September 2017 when he said:

… it is now cheaper to build renewables than it is to build … coal.

It also came in the form of comments back in November 2015 by the Greens' leader, Senator Di Natale, who said:

It's cheaper now to build wind power than it is to build coal-fired power and … it'll soon be cheaper to build solar as well.

They're not the only people offering this advice. Renewable energy advocates tell us so. Kane Thornton, the CEO of the Clean Energy Council, in May 2017, said:

Renewable energy is now the cheapest kind of new power generation that can be built today—less than both new coal and new gas-fired power plants.

The opposition leader, Mr Shorten, says:

Renewable energy is the cheapest form of new electricity generation.

So I don't understand why the Greens or, indeed, the Labor Party would be disappointed that, having heard their expert advice and opinions on these issues—we have listened carefully—we have taken them at their word and we are now acting on it. Because if they're right—if it is indeed now cheaper to build new renewable energy than it is to build new coal or new gas or other forms of energy production—then all the system of subsidy, support and assistance that the renewable energy sector has received in this country, particularly over the last decade, is now no longer necessary. If they're right and it is cheaper, then the market will decide, and the market will decide in favour of renewable energy. You don't need to force anyone to build new renewable energy—you don't even need to incentivise them to do so—if it is indeed true that renewable energy is, in fact, cheaper than alternative sources of energy.

So all the government has done is accept the advice provided by the Greens, the Labor Party and the renewable energy industry and announced a new policy which finally calls time and draws to an end the era of subsidies for energy—for renewable energy in particular, which has been most generously subsidised over the past decade. We know, for example, that the renewable energy target has been a spectacularly generous form of subsidy for the renewable energy industry. It has been dubbed—I think very appropriately—this week by the Prime Minister and the environment minister as industry policy masquerading as energy policy or environmental policy, because the truth is that this policy was devised and expanded particularly spectacularly under Kevin Rudd's time as Prime Minister as a means of supporting the growth of an industry for industry policy reasons, not really for environmental policy reasons. We know the renewable energy target is in fact a very expensive form of carbon abatement and not a very efficient way of reducing carbon emissions, if that is your major objective.

The renewable energy target will peak in 2020 and come to its natural end in 2030, and it won't be extended by this government. It won't be replaced by this government by any other form of mandate such as the clean energy target, as suggested by some. Instead, it will be replaced by a new policy which puts an appropriate emphasis on two of the other major priorities of energy policy and the things which this government believes should be the top priorities of energy policy: first and foremost, reliability; and, second, affordability.

At the same time, of course, we want to meet our commitments made at the Paris climate change conference to reduce our emissions by at least 26 per cent from 2005 levels, and we are very confident that we will reach that under this policy. We're confident because this policy ensures that there will be continued investment in newer, lower-emissions technology, and we're confident because we believe in technological progress. We believe in innovation. We believe in the wonderful entrepreneurs in the renewable energy sector and elsewhere who are devising new and better ways to produce energy with lower emissions, who don't need subsidies, assistance or intervention by government to ensure that that technology is delivered and rolled out. As we have heard from the Greens, renewable energy advocates and the Labor Party, it is now cheaper to do so.

But a real strength of this policy is that it takes a genuinely agnostic approach towards different sources of reductions in emissions. The truth is the planet doesn't care if those reductions in emissions come about by rolling out a wind farm, rolling out a solar farm, or replacing an old, inefficient, outdated coal-fired power station with a new, more efficient coal-fired power station that has lower emissions. All the planet notices is the reduction in emissions. Indeed, it's true that you can build a new high-efficiency, low-emissions coal-fired power station, including using brown coal in my home state of Victoria, that can reduce emissions from older, out-of-date power stations by up to 40 per cent. A 40 per cent reduction in emissions should be something that everybody who cares about this policy area would welcome. We shouldn't be dogmatic about how the emission reductions come about if our genuine objective is just to reduce emissions. That's why I'm really encouraged by the new policy adopted by the government this week.

I want to finish on one final point. The Greens have accused the government of in this case being unwilling to embrace progress. I've just pointed out how the Greens are unwilling to face progress if the progress happens to be in the form of new, more efficient coal-fired power generation. But, of course, that's not the only area where the Greens are opposed to progress. In fact, you could easily call the Greens an antiscience party, because the Greens are so often against scientific progress if it doesn't fit with their environmental ideology. Coal-fired power stations with new technology are one example of that. Another example of that is genetically modified crops, of which my new colleague from Western Australia, Senator Brockman, spoke about so eloquently this week. It is innovations in agriculture such as the invention of golden rice which have allowed massive productivity gains in agriculture and farming, allowing enormous increases in output that are helping to feed the world better than we have ever been able to feed it before. Of course, the Greens have fought and opposed it every step of the way.

They're opposed to nuclear power. They have irrational fear and hatred of nuclear power and they believe that that's a dangerous technology. It's another example of progress that they oppose. They're even opposed to the harvesting of gas resources, if they're done in new, modern ways, like so-called unconventional coal seam gas extraction, which is working very well in Queensland and which is being used all around the world, particularly in the United States. Indeed, the success of the United States in reducing its emissions, despite the fact that the administration has pulled out of the Paris climate agreement, has come about largely because the US has transitioned to a much heavier use of gas, which produces lower emissions than some alternatives. That has come about because of the shale gas revolution, which, of course, does rely on unconventional means of accessing it. So, it's not the coalition Turnbull government that's opposed to progress; it is the Greens.

Jenny McAllister (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is sometimes said that amateur psychological diagnoses tell you as much about the person who is making the diagnosis as they do about the subject. I think the same could often be said for the topics the Greens dish up for MPIs. It is telling that a day after a major policy announcement the Greens have given us an MPI not about policy but about the government's polling numbers. It's suggestive of a world view that sees climate change and energy as a campaign issue rather than as a policy issue—a strategy that would prefer to wedge than to achieve outcomes—and I find that disappointing. I've spent perhaps 20 years working, in one way or another, on environmental policy, and that's not how I see climate or energy.

I don't want to talk about the government's polling numbers, as difficult as they are. The government has dished up a vague, light-on-detail plan for energy, and I want to talk about that instead. Here are three big questions that I think the government needs to answer before the rest of the country can take this energy plan seriously. Big question No. 1 is this: where are the emission cuts going to come from if not from the electricity sector? The plan seems to be built on the idea that the electricity sector will do its share of abatement. But the problem with that is that the sector can make reductions far more economically and efficiently than other sectors in the economy. The government would know this, if it had done any modelling—which it acknowledges it hasn't. Every other exercise, every other detailed government study that's been undertaken by the Treasury to model the approach that we'd take to cost-effectively reduce carbon has shown that the electricity sector is one of the most important places where we can make cost-effective emissions reductions and make sure that the transition to a low-carbon economy is as cost effective as it possibly can be.

The question we have to ask is this: if there is only, say, a 26 per cent target applied to the electricity sector, where does the rest of the burden land? In the absence of any government modelling or analysis or public information, we can rely on other people like RepuTex, a very important group of analysts. They say that if a 26 per cent target was applied across all sectors of the economy then the modelling indicates the burden to reduce emissions would fall disproportionately on the direct combustion of oil and gas and transport sectors, Australia's emissions growth areas. These sectors would be liable for 31 and 32 per cent of all emission reductions to meet the 2030 target despite only making up 17 and 18 per cent of all emissions. Comparatively, the electricity sector would contribute only 20 per cent of all abatement. In other words, under the government's plan, according to this analysis—and we're waiting to see any government analysis—we won't reach our Paris targets unless there are deep cuts in emissions in other sectors. What's all this going to mean? What will it mean for workers in the manufacturing sector? What will it mean for workers in the transport sector? What will it mean for workers in mining? Or, is the government going to abandon the commitment to the Paris targets? These are questions the government needs to answer.

The government rhetoric about the price impact of this has all been very certain, and that's the big question No. 2: what impact will this have on prices?

The experts, Dr Schott and Mr Pierce, have been relied on by the government for this idea that this is going to save households $115 a year. But when you ask the experts, Dr Schott last night on television said, 'I don't think anyone can guarantee a price reduction,' and Mr Pierce acknowledged that it really just depended on which scenario you were talking about and that in some scenarios you see a much, much smaller price reduction per year for households. The third big question—and perhaps the most important one—is: how long will it be before the government is going to have to capitulate or backflip on elements of this policy to appease the conservative hard Right in its party room?

This plan is clearly half-baked. It needed much more time in development. It needed time for proper modelling. What we've been presented with isn't actually a policy. It's a high-level internal summary that you might write before you go off and do the work to produce a real policy. Year 12 students all across the country are sitting their HSC exams right now. If one of them handed in this plan as part of their assessment, they would be asked, 'Where is the rest?' In truth, this is nothing more than a bunch of ideas that are going to be 'worked up', in the language of the minister, in the lead-up to COAG. The Prime Minister has claimed it was developed by the Energy Security Board, but that entity was only formed in September. Why has the government served up a half-finished plan? I'll tell you what I think: they couldn't afford another week of the member of Warringah talking about energy policy and the government not actually having a response.

Former Prime Minister Abbott has had far more success controlling the political agenda from the backbench than he ever had in office, and that is a consequence of the weakness of this Prime Minister. What we see in response to all of this is a political fix for an internal political problem. It is about isolating and fixing the problem of the former Prime Minister, and it is not about solving the energy crisis that they've allowed to develop on their watch.

The coalition don't have strong views about whether or not this is a good policy solution. They actually don't care. This is a good political solution, and they will presumably be willing to change it, to gut it or to abandon it when the former Prime Minister moves the goal posts on the current Prime Minister once again. It's what we've seen on every other occasion. It's what happened on the ETS. It's what Mr Abbott did to him on the EIS—remember that? Mr Frydenberg came out and said, 'I'd be willing to consider it,' but within 24 hours he was forced to retract that. He said, 'Oh, no, we're not considering it.' It's certainly what happened to the clean energy target, the CET—remember that? It's also what happened on the RET.

We now understand, with quite some precision, how the life cycle of the Prime Minister's policy ideas work. There is a day or two of a media sugar hit. It feels pretty good and people perk up a bit. Then we all start to hear the gentle hissing sound as the air escapes from the balloon and the responsible minister, in this case poor Mr Frydenberg—for whom I do feel some sympathy—is left holding the policy. It's my prediction that this energy policy will go the same way.

Back in 2004, the writer Ron Suskind interviewed an unnamed White House aide. He later identified that aide as Karl Rove. It's one of my favourite quotes, because I think it really defines the mindset of conservatives in politics at the moment. Mr Suskind wrote:

The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." … "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

It's a very muscular approach to politics, isn't it—a very arrogant belief that you can escape the gravity of facts. But I'll tell you what you can't escape. You can't escape gravity, and you can't escape facts.

This government has decided to avoid the judicious study of discernible reality. In fact, it seems to hold contempt for reality, for the trends that are emerging globally in energy policy. After years of ignoring the problems in Australia's energy sector, the government has just acted—no modelling, no planning, no consultation. I'll tell you what. It didn't go that well for Karl Rove, and I doubt it will for this Prime Minister either.

Malcolm Roberts (Queensland, Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The key function of being a servant to the people of Queensland and Australia is to listen. This morning I retweeted a quote from a self-styled energy activist, Mr Luis Aramburu, who boldly and correctly said:

The green fringe is against:

Coal

…

Natural gas

Nuclear

and even hydro. What do they want? The starvation of most of humanity?

Mr Aramburu sums up the Australian political landscape so clearly. This country is being consumed by the green fringe, contrary to what people want, and that is the real reason political parties are sliding. We see that at both state and federal level and in the churning of government. The truth behind poll numbers is that both the ALP and the LNP are sliding, not just the LNP. The ALP's primary votes are dwelling in the low 30s. Why? Why are numbers so low?

The reason is that Australian political parties have taken a lurch to the left, abandoned Australian values and trashed common sense, becoming destroyers of humanity, not builders of humanity. Parties have embraced Marxism, and everyday Aussies have had a gutful. No new dams and no new coal-fired power stations are being built. Gas is off the radar, and we won't consider nuclear. Instead, successive governments have relied on the hope and prayer of the sun shining or the wind blowing, and our economy is now paying the price.

The current ruin of our economy shows why the political parties are suffering with poor poll numbers. It is the opposite to the picture painted by this Greens motion. The secret to increasing poll numbers, as history shows, is not to embrace more whacky-backy Greens tripe but to repudiate it, cast it aside, reject it and denounce it. In its place, we should suggest a progressive view of humanity that hopes for and relies on the best of society, a vision of where we once were, a proud nation, united under one vision to build a successful future based on jobs for everyone in a safe and secure society.

We can only build this type of vision that unites Australians when we listen to what Australians need. People tell us they need cheap power, yet not everyone in the chamber is—in fact, few are—apt to be listening. For example, Senator McGrath came into the chamber recently and carried on about where Liberal Party senators live across Queensland, as if that mattered. For what it's worth, Liberal senators could live on the moon, because, from what we see, it doesn't matter where LNP parliamentarians live; they still don't listen to rural and regional Queenslanders around them.

If the Liberals and Nationals listened to people, they would realise that Australians and Queenslanders want the renewable energy target dumped now, not in three years when electricity prices have doubled as a result of the new policy. They want it dumped now. If they would listen, they would learn that people are worried about electricity prices and that to focus solely on reliability instead of price is folly. When the process of delivering a service is improved, the reliability of that service goes up, and the price of that service goes down. We need to work on the process. What we are doing here with this government, this opposition and the Greens is tinkering with the fundamentals and destroying it.

The Greens created a problem that doesn't exist to force action that's not needed. In their rush for seeking Greens preferences, both the LNP and the ALP have fallen for the climate con and now the energy con. Instead of relying on unsupported opinions, we must base policy on solid data that will withstand scrutiny. Human progress depends on cheap energy. That has been shown for 170 years. Now, in the last 10 years, we have reversed that. One Nation's message to Senator McGrath and the general body politic is clear: to win votes and reduce the cost of power, take action today. We can come over to your office, Senator McGrath, and give feedback we've heard from Queenslanders as we travel around our state. Our door is always open, as should be everyone's in this chamber.

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say to my good friend Senator Roberts: you are nothing if not consistent. You've come into this chamber consistently, you've had a consistent view and you've maintained that view. I don't believe anything I say or do will be able to change your view. Nonetheless, I will give it a go because we live in hope, Senator. I hope that by the time you leave this Senate your views on this issue will have evolved and changed. I suspect by next week they won't have.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Was that a valedictory speech?

Sam Dastyari (NSW, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'll take that interjection. The interjection was, 'Was that a valedictory speech?' I don't believe it was. I understand the tradition for valedictory speeches is they are not cut off at 20 minutes. I believe it will be an exciting four or five hours when and if Senator Roberts delivers a valedictory speech in this chamber. He will take some of the Americans on for time.

What we have seen is a government that will hold, and has held, every single different possible position when it comes to the issue of climate change and the issue of tackling the energy crisis that Australia is facing. It is true that any pressure or ability to lower prices is something that should be welcomed, but I just want to say that the gap between what has been promised and what is being delivered by this government is astronomical. Again, while people under financial pressure should welcome and do welcome anything that's going to make their lives better, let's put this in perspective.

We heard Senator Brandis refer to the government's own experts yesterday. The government's own experts came out overnight and were talking about something in the vicinity of 50 cents a week being saved—50 cents a week! I said this morning that this is soft serve savings. This is enough money to buy a soft serve ice cream. Actually, I have to correct the record: it's not enough to buy a soft serve ice cream. A soft serve ice cream at McDonald's is now 60 cents—it's not even 50 cents any more. I'm as shocked as you are, Mr Acting Deputy President Williams! I can see it in your face. That's where things are at after the big promise and the big process we've gone through. The government has held every single position at a different point in time and the Prime Minister, Mr Turnbull, has done the same.

Just a few weeks ago, we were told by the Prime Minister that a clean energy target—these were the Prime Minister's own words—'would certainly work'. They were the Prime Minister's own words. The minister, Mr Frydenberg, from the other place, told us that a clean energy target would reduce electricity prices. He went on to say that Dr Finkel has shown his mechanism is to reduce emissions and, increasingly important today, ensure the stability of the system as it undergoes dramatic change. The recommendation at the heart of the Finkel process and at the heart of the Finkel report, was this idea that we were going to have a clean energy target. It's not good enough for the government to say 'we adopted everything else'. The government adopted all the easy stuff, and the one that was going to make the most significant difference, the clean energy target, was the one part of the process that wasn't adopted. Just in the last parliamentary session, we were told that the answer to Australia's energy needs was to keep the Liddell power station open, a coal-fired power station; words that, surprisingly, in this session of parliament don't even pass their lips. In the last session of parliament, it was all about Liddell, Liddell, Liddell. Now, it's not. It sometimes feels strange to be on this side of the chamber, arguing some of these points when normally these are arguments made by those on the other side of the chamber. The idea that a commercial company makes a commercial decision not to go ahead with a power plant for the sole reason that they don't believe it's in their commercial interests to do so, and to have a centre-right government turn around and say 'no, they should be forced to keep it open' because of ideology, when the economics of it aren't even stacking up, is, I think, somewhat concerning.

The problem with the government's energy politics is they just haven't caught up with the reality that is the future of energy economics. Let's remind ourselves: 10 years ago, there was a bipartisan consensus over the need for an emissions trading system of some kind and for climate action—10 years ago that consensus existed. Under Prime Minister Howard and Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Turnbull—that's right, the same gentleman who is now the Prime Minister of Australia, and Mr Howard was the Prime Minister then—the political contest was about which party would do more on climate change. This was in the lead-up to the 2007 election. Within 10 years, Australia has some of the world's highest power prices and some of the world's worst pollution per capita.

I want to touch on the issue of the clean energy target, because I think the Finkel report really outlined the significance of having a holistic approach that looks at including these types of measures. The Finkel clean energy target renewables would have been around 42 per cent of our total generation—42 per cent of our total generation. Mr Finkel—as I know you are aware is the Chief Scientist and about as nonpartisan as one can be—recommended a clean energy target because it would keep power prices lower, cut pollution and create jobs in renewables. Yesterday, the PM not only turned his back on his own Chief Scientist and a clean energy target that had the support of groups across the community but also on the renewable energy industry. The future of energy innovation and science in this country has paid for the forfeit of the coalition party room troglodytes. The Prime Minister has come up with a policy that will strangle renewable energy investment in jobs in this country and, instead, has embraced former Prime Minister Abbott's vision of where to head on these matters. The Prime Minister has, in his very typical way, gone with the worst possible option, walking away from a clean energy target. And what has happened as a result of this? Investors are in the lurch. As much as the government likes to pretend that somehow there has now been some certainty created, no certainty has been created by a haphazard policy that has simply been reached in a bid to settle the quarrels within the conservative side of politics. It's left investors in the lurch, it's certainly left business in the lurch, and it's made the job for Australia of reducing our emissions much more difficult.

The Finkel review noted that, even under the chaotic business-as-usual scenario modelling by Finkel, renewables would have made up nearly 40 per cent of generation capacity. Under the government's plan announced yesterday, renewables will make up just 28 per cent of power generation in 2030 and 36 per cent under the most optimistic proposal that can be put forward. Indeed, there may be no additional renewable energy capacity built beyond what is driven by the existing renewable energy target, which will cease in 2020.

We, on this side of politics, have been offering bipartisan support to the government for months on proper energy policy. Suddenly, without proper notice, we are expected to support the latest thought bubble from the government, without modelling and without appropriate research. The government doesn't want to have bipartisanship on this issue. They don't want to have that. What they want to have isn't a settlement across Australia; they want desperately to find a settlement within their own party.

Just to touch on what a Labor government would do and what a Shorten Labor government would do: there is a recognition that we have to modernise the energy market laws to give more power to consumers and we have to create renewable energy zones to drive investment. We need to change the Clean Energy Finance Corporation investment return benchmark so they can invest in more generation and storage projects. And, while the government is so tied up fighting with itself and blaming everyone else, Labor has to focus and will continue to focus on a positive alternative to tackle power prices. I thank the Senate for debating this issue.

Jonathon Duniam (Tasmania, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to kick off where Senator Dastyari started. I look forward to that very constructive, positive alternative approach to bringing down power prices, because to date I have seen nothing. I have seen a history lesson—raking over the coals of history; pardon the pun—in this debate. There has been talk of every position the government has had when it comes to energy policy, focusing on the past rather than actually talking about what they would do as an alternative government as the people who aspire to sit on this side of the chamber. It's all about history; it's not about the future, it's all about division and political pointscoring. It is not about solving the issues that face the Australian community.

After sitting here for the last 20 minutes or so, one interesting observation I can make is that with Senator Roberts on one side saying our policy does not go far enough and on the other side and at the other end of the spectrum Labor and the Greens saying we don't do enough, maybe we have some balance there. Maybe we are approaching things the right way in the interests of the majority of Australians, people who pay power bills and who are struggling to pay those power bills. The point I want to make is this: it's all about certainty. It is about providing that environment of certainty for those who generate the electricity, the market players. They need to be able to invest their money with some certainty so we can plan for the future. It's about having a reliable energy source. It's about having certainty, and knowing that when we flick the switch the lights are going to come on, the factory can start operating at 6 am or whenever it opens up and the jobs are going to be there. It is also about certainty about the price, that we are not going to see incredible increases into the future.

My colleagues have gone over history a little bit already. Every time we talk about energy, I like to talk about a bit of history from my perspective. In my home state of Tasmania, there is a great publication known as the Hobart Mercury newspaper. They published an article on 20 October 1981, a little while ago, entitled 'Coal-fired power best option'. It was written by a gentleman by the name of Wayne Crawford. It says: 'Tasmania's environmental lobby has expressed preferences for coal-fired thermal power generation over construction of more hydro power dams. The director of the Tasmanian Wilderness Society, Dr Bob Brown, said yesterday that if there was to be a new power station, then coal-fired thermal was the best centralised option we have.' He then went on to say, that the conservation movement regarded a coal-fired thermal station as 'manifestly better than more dams.'

Later on in the article, it talks about cutting back the consumption of power, because that's the answer. It is not about catering to the demands of a growing society where we have more people living in our communities. It is about cutting back on demands. Dr Brown said, 'The environmental movement believed that if Tasmania's electricity's consumption now'—at that point in time, 'is the highest per capita in the world, it could be cut back by 15 per cent through an energy-saving program.' There would also be no need for new power schemes. I'm not a big fan of that idea. Given the way the world is going, with the demands society has, increasing technology and the like, we should be catering to those demands, and we can. We have the resources, we have the technology, we should be catering to it.

Later on in the article, it says that the coal-fired power station would 'provide more jobs over a longer period' and could be built more quickly than a hydro scheme and would give the state more flexibility in its power generation. I won't go on about that too long but I think it is great to just reflect on that a little bit. It was the former Australian Greens leader, former Senator Bob Brown, who was being talked about earlier today by my good friend and colleague over there, who advocated for more coal-fired power stations and no more renewable energy in the form of hydro power. It was only a year or two later that we had the Franklin Dam dispute, which saw halted the construction of a dam which would have saved Tasmania the energy woes that we went through a couple of years ago. But, as I say, that's all history.

Going back to the question of certainty—giving energy certainty around the investments they can make, having the ability to know that we will have dispatchable base-load power when it is needed—I heard Audrey Zibelman say that the current situation is not sustainable if we are to actually tackle the cost of power. When we look at situations like the one we had in South Australia and other situations on the National Electricity Market—where demand is far outstripping supply with intermittent renewables—the options for the market operator, Ms Zibelman, to pursue are limited. She pointed to gas-fired power generation and the high cost attached to that, and she used the words that this was 'the most inefficient way of doing it'. So Ms Zibelman, being one of the contributors to the policy, the plan that's been set out here that has been announced by the government, has found a way to provide that certainty. I think that is a great thing.

I want also to talk about the issue of cost—the savings that have been discussed here and the aim of bringing down the price of power. The Energy Security Board has indicated to us that the savings could be in the order of $100 to $115 a year. That's a lot of money. When the Community Affairs Committee considers things like reductions in welfare support, many on the other side of the chamber will point out that reductions of 50c cents or $1 in support payments to people make a massive difference when they have a stretched income. So why is it so bad to find a savings in one's power bill, even if it as little as Senator Dastyari and others have said—50 cents? They are the same people who in these debates say that the welfare reforms that have been proposed, which have resulted in some reductions to people who depend on those payments, will stretch the budget—but, no, we shouldn't pass on a saving in any shape or form when it comes to the household power bill!

I, like most other Tasmanians, have seen a massive increase in my power bills. It's not as big an issue for me as it is for many other Tasmanians. I happen to be a member of the Australian Senate and I'm paid very well—and that's on the public record. My winter-quarter power bill was $3,000. The more recent bill was $2,900—and I don't think that's because power prices have gone down; I think it's because I've been encouraging my three boys to turn the lights out more. But this is the thing: power bills are so significant in my home state, where we have largely renewables based energy generation. We have a plan to actually bring down the cost of power. We are talking about ways that will impact on the cost of power for households and for businesses. We will be able to continue to support businesses and manufacturing, so that people can pay their bills.

We talk about subsidies for renewable energy as well. Labor's plan would see $66 billion in subsidies paid to support renewable energy generation. Where does that come from? It comes from either the taxpayer or from energy users, the consumers. Someone is going to pay; this money doesn't just appear. And that's what Labor are proposing—unlike our plan, which removes those subsidies. Senator Paterson, earlier in the debate, highlighted the comments made by proponents of renewable energy. Coming from a state where renewable energy is generated as much as it is, it is great to hear that that it is one of the cheapest forms of energy in Australia. There is the case made to remove those subsidies. So why does the opposition cling to this need to prop up this sector of the energy generation industry with subsidies to the tune of $66 billion?

Yesterday, one of my colleagues from Tasmania, Senator Singh, claimed that that money should go to supporting the 28,000 jobs that could be developed in the renewable energy sector. That's a lot of money for each of those jobs. That is $66 billion of your money, Mr Acting Deputy President, either as a power user or as a taxpayer.

We do have a plan. My friends on the other side have, as usual, wanted to go over the history of how we arrived here, rather than being constructive and positive about the future—though I note Senator Dastyari did promise there would be a positive alternative approach taken by Labor when it comes to reducing the price of power. I look forward to that coming out in the near future while this debate is on foot, because we can't consider things in isolation. They are all inextricably linked—affordability, reliability and meeting our international obligations. (Time expired)

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to contribute to this matter of public importance discussion. The Prime Minister yesterday announced the government's new energy plan or policy. We don't have the details of it; we don't have the modelling. The Prime Minister wants us believe that perhaps this will save householders money—maybe 50c by the year 2020, if they're lucky. Of course, what we do know is that one of the best ways of reducing electricity prices is to help people put solar panels on their roofs and batteries in their backyards. If this were really about helping everyday Australians and small businesses to reduce their power bills, that's what this government would be doing. But, instead, the Turnbull government has taken the axe to the renewable energy sector.

I stand here as a very proud South Australian. Our state is the renewables state. The investment from the renewable industry into our state has been in the vicinity of billions and billions of dollars, with billions and billions to come if, indeed, the industry is able to get on with the job of providing clean, reliable and affordable renewable energy to customers, to householders and to businesses across the state. Hopefully, if we're able to have a properly built interconnector between South Australia and New South Wales, which we desperately need, we might also be able to export that green power interstate as well. But what we've had from the Turnbull government is just another attack on South Australians, on South Australian businesses, on our industry and on South Australian jobs.

Make no mistake, an ideological war within the Turnbull government—fuelled, of course, by the ghost of the former Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, lurking in the dark shadows, making problems and trouble for the Prime Minister—is why this policy is in place. This government is obsessed with doing everything it can to keep alive a dying coal industry. At a time when we are meant to be reducing pollution and cutting emissions, we have the Prime Minister of Australia, because he is scared of the antics of the former Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, wanting to prop up the coal industry. The last thing we should be doing is throwing good money after bad to fund more coal-fired power stations and even open the world's largest coalmine with Adani. Make no mistake, this policy announced by the government yesterday is more about a turf war inside the Liberal Party than it is about reducing the electricity bills of Australian households or doing anything to combat and deal with global warming and climate change and to reduce pollution.

We all know—the experts have said it time and time again—that the reason electricity prices are high in this country is that the big, old power companies have been price gouging and ripping off customers for years. They've been able to get away with it because the government have turned a blind eye. Now the government want to use taxpayers' money to give subsidies to coal power, throwing good money after bad and attacking the renewable energy industry on their way through. This will cost South Australians jobs—no doubt about it. This will cost South Australians investment money, and the Greens will do everything we can to stand up to this reckless, irresponsible and politically ridiculous plan from the government.

If you want to reduce electricity bills, help people put solar on their roofs and batteries in their backyards. That's the best way of ensuring that householders and small businesses can afford their renewable energy, and they also get to help the planet as well because it's clean, it's renewable and it's cheap. But this is an ideological war from the government, just as we've seen already today with their ideological obsession with beating up on the ABC. Today in this place the government tabled legislation from the deal they did with One Nation to take the axe to the ABC. This is a government that is obsessed with ideological warfare inside their own party room. It's Tony Abbott and the other right-wing nut jobs in the backbench of the Liberal Party—

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Point of order. Excuse me, Senator Hanson-Young.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You can't take a point of order from the chair.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Sorry. My apologies. Resume your seat, Senator Hanson-Young. I bring your attention to the debating rules, on referring to those in the other place with respect. I have raised this many times. I ask you to take that in consideration when you speak for the duration of your time.

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. There is ideological warfare going on inside the Liberal Party, and it's between the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, and the former Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, and his merry men, right-wing nut jobs on the backbench of the National and Liberal parties.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Hanson-Young, resume your seat. Under standing order 193, you can't make imputations against those in the other place or here. It would be beneficial if you withdraw that statement you just made about those in the other place.

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Acting Deputy President, I'm happy to not repeat those words, but I don't understand how those who were involved in ideological warfare over right-wing politics are not right-wing nut jobs.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Senator Hanson-Young, repeating it doesn't help one bit.

Honourable senators interjecting—

Hang on. I'm speaking. I draw your attention to standing order 193, on showing respect to those in the other place as well as here. You may continue, but if you do it in future I'm going to ask you to withdraw. Is that clear? Continue.

Sarah Hanson-Young (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. What we've got is an ideological war, and it is holding this parliament to ransom. We've got the government introducing legislation to cut the ABC, demanded by One Nation, and now we've got the government wanting to give taxpayer money to keep open coalmines and coal-fired power stations. It's an ideological war, and it's holding the parliament and the future of this country to ransom.

Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Prime Minister's capitulation to the coal industry will be an unmitigated disaster for my state of Tasmania. This, on the face of it, takes the axe to the renewable energy target, which means that a number of new renewable projects that are in the pipeline in Tasmania will now have a business case that will be compromised or at least not as promising as it would otherwise have been. It means that Hydro Tasmania, the Tasmanian government owned electricity generation business, will lose a flow of renewable energy certificate revenue from 2030, and ultimately this will mean less renewable energy in Tasmania, fewer opportunities for Tasmanians, fewer jobs in Tasmania and less capacity for Tasmania to play a significant role in displacing coal-fired power from the national grid.

So it's an unmitigated disaster for Tasmania. It's an unmitigated disaster for the renewable energy sector in this country. And that sound we can hear—there it goes!—is the corks popping in the boardrooms of coal companies in this country.

John Williams (NSW, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time for the discussion has expired.