Michael Ronaldson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Minister for Veterans’ Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you. What an extraordinary question, Senator Milne. It beggars belief—through you, Mr President—that you can actually stretch a bit of string as long as that. What I will say—

Senator Milne interjecting—

Do you want an answer to the question or not? Mr President, what we have made quite clear is that this government supports renewable energy. We are committed to a RET that allows sustainable growth in both the small- and large-scale renewable energy sectors. As you are acutely aware, we have made it quite clear that we will not change the level of support provided to household solar. In fact, I think even those opposite acknowledge that the RET is broken, and if they came to the table we could probably get this resolved a bit quicker. Those opposite—not you, of course, Senator Milne—know that the RET is broken. That is why we said to the Australian Labor Party: 'Come and join us. Come and talk about it. Start getting a long-term vision for where we need to be.' You, Senator Milne, of course, are completely out of this debate. You are irrelevant to this debate. But I do say to those opposite: 'Come and talk to us and see if we can resolve this issue'.

What is also quite clear is we want to fix the RET. We have said that. And we have put forward a clear proposal that would provide certainty for the sector and see the amount of renewable energy produced under the scheme double between now and 2020. We have said we will not change anything in relation to household solar. We have also said we are going to exempt emissions— (Time expired)