Angus Taylor (Hume, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for O'Connor for his question. As one of the most experienced farmers in this place, he is a representative of a strong agricultural and mining region in the west of Australia and he understands the importance of a technology led approach to providing affordable, reliable energy and bringing down our emissions. It's developments in technology that will strengthen our regions and reduce our emissions without adding costs and without slashing jobs. That's our focus. It's technology, not taxes, and that's why we expanded ARENA's mandate: so it can invest in all priority technologies on our technology investment road map, including clean hydrogen, clean steel and aluminium, soil carbon regenerating our soils and making them healthier, and carbon capture and storage.

Just overnight the UK announced their plan to get to net zero, which includes $1 billion for a carbon capture and storage fund to reduce emissions by 20 to 30 million tonnes across a series of different hubs. They are very similar to our policy. Like the UK, President Joe Biden has said he will double down on carbon capture and storage. The IEA and the IPCC both regard carbon capture as absolutely essential to achieving the goals of the Paris agreement, and that's crucial to making sure we have strong traditional industries in a country like ours as we bring down our emissions. Indeed, the only people who are refusing to support CCS and the jobs and industries they bought are sitting right there in the Australian Labor Party.

To achieve our stretch goals in our road map, we need utilised the expertise of every agency we have, including ARENA, but again, twice this week, we have seen the Labor Party joining forces with the Greens to vote against the technology led approach to reducing emissions. Talk about the tail wagging the dog. The member for Melbourne's tail wags this dog every day. Seven times they voted against ARENA investing in low-emissions technology, including low-emissions vehicles—electric vehicles. Seven times they voted against more jobs for Australian workers. Seven times they have gone out of their way to undermine the prosperity of regional Australia. Together with the Greens, they seek to weaken our traditional industries of mining, agriculture and manufacturing and undermine our regions.

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