Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Some of the people who are most vulnerable and most in need of the protections that we have secured for them today with the energy retailers are indeed pensioners. As you know, the Brotherhood of St Laurence, St Vincents and the Grattan Institute have observed that far too many people—older people in particular, pensioners, and people on lower incomes—are paying standard offers for electricity because they are not aware of, and have not taken advantage of, lower discounted plans. This is the point that we have been addressing with the energy retailers today. The critically important thing is to ensure that those customers are protected, and that will be done by ensuring that it will become part of the law—the regulations under the national electricity law—that, if they are on an outdated or expired plan or a plan that is about to expire, they have to be made fully aware of what the consequences of that are and the opportunities to get a better deal and therefore pay less for their electricity. That's going to particularly benefit the people that you're referring to.

As to the general protections in the electricity market, can I say to the honourable member that the most important thing is to ensure that Australians right now are not paying any more for electricity than they need to pay. We have many reforms underway. Bringing down the price of gas—there has already been some progress there. We're stopping the network owners from gaming the system and appealing against the regulators' reviews and getting higher prices for their poles and wires.

Mr Fitzgibbon interjecting—

Mr Dreyfus interjecting—

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