Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the motion moved by the member for Fairfax about the cost of electricity in Queensland, seconded by an MP from Western Australia. My understanding is that, unless they have snuck in an interconnector recently, Western Australia is not part of the National Electricity Market and is not providing any electricity in Queensland. Then we have just heard from an MP from New South Wales. It is a sad state of affairs when the member for Fairfax cannot find any friends among all those Queensland MPs. It is indicative of them deserting Queensland.

It is a bit rich to have the member for Fairfax criticise the Queensland government about power prices while we have seen power prices double under members in the LNP federal government. I agree with the member for Fairfax that there is a big threat to electricity prices in Australia, but it is the Turnbull government's backbench. In fact, it is sitting right next to him. In fact, he is right between them right now, packing down as hooker between two of the biggest dinosaurs in this parliament. We have had a complete lack of coherent strategy for climate and energy policy under Prime Minister Abbott and then Prime Minister Turnbull, and it will continue whenever Prime Minister Abbott comes back again. They have destroyed certainty in investment; we have seen that. We saw a collapse of over 80 per cent in private equity investment in renewable energy, all leading to a lack of supply and driving up prices under their watch, as they are about to start their fifth year in government.

While the Turnbull government fights among itself and sticks its head in the sand, let's look at what the Queensland government has done. I would point out to the member for Fairfax that we had three years of Campbell Newman and—what is that Treasurer's name?—Tim Nicholls. That is right—Tim Nicholls. We had a whole experiment there for three years. What have the Palaszczuk government done in response? They have done what they can to stimulate alternative generation to increase supply. One gigawatt of renewable projects are in the pipeline, and even more are proposed. An investment of more than $2 billion will put clear downward pressure on wholesale prices and create more than 2,000 jobs in Queensland regions, because the Labor Party still believes in the bush, unlike the Liberal National Party, which has been hijacked by the Liberals. The Nats have forgotten the bush.

When the member for Fairfax talks about electricity prices in his motion, I notice that the prices he quotes are wholesale, not retail. Volatility in wholesale prices can be seen across the NEM, as those who understand electricity know. We heard that from the member for Shortland. However, what those opposite neglect to mention is that Queensland has had the lowest average wholesale price since February. In fact, since the Queensland Labor government announced their Powering Queensland plan, wholesale prices have fallen dramatically in the futures market. I actually printed it out. Looking at the baseload future prices as at Wednesday, 21 June—it is hot off the press, Member for Fairfax—under Queensland we see that this is what people have factored into the market, and that will be 30 per cent of the average that households will actually pay. That is important. We see that for Queensland they are projecting that in 2018 it will go down by 14.2 per cent, in 2019 it will go down by 10.5 per cent and in 2020 it will go down by 8.1 per cent. This is not a Labor policy; this is actually what the financiers are locking in right now. When the member for Fairfax talks about electricity prices, he needs to not focus only on spot prices but to look at how the NEM—the National Electricity Market—is designed, to factor in a lot of things.

Spot prices have behaved similarly almost every year since its creation; I understand that. Of course, any of these peak prices are all investigated by the Australian Energy Regulator. They have looked at a report into spot market prices on 13 and 14 January, and if the member for Fairfax was in Queensland on those days then he might remember that we had the fifth and sixth days of a heatwave. Heatwaves highlight the growing bite of climate change on our atmosphere and our electricity prices. Those opposite would have you believe that renewables and real action on climate change are part of the problem, but Finkel and sensible, rational people know that we need to work on a lasting solution.

The problem with the member for Fairfax using wholesale prices, as his motion refers to, is that they only tell half of the story. In three disastrous years under the Newman-Nicholls government—those horror years—the retail electricity prices in Queensland skyrocketed by 43 per cent on the Liberal-National Party's watch. There is no mention of that in his speech. However, since the Palaszczuk government came to power, retail prices have only risen by 1.9 per cent.

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