Bob Katter (Kennedy, Katter's Australian Party) Share this | Hansard source

I was the minister for electricity in Queensland when we had the cheapest electricity in the world, by a long way. We had a reserved resource policy, with the much-maligned Country Party Bjelke-Petersen government. You did not get the coal unless you gave us free coal for our power stations. That's a serious reserved resource policy. We didn't let them walk all over the top of us, so we had the cheapest power in the world. It was $674. The incoming ALP government continued that for three years and then signed up to the free market National Competition Policy agreement, and the price shot through the roof. So don't let the conservatives say that it was the Greens that put the price through the roof. It was the free marketeers that put the price through the roof.

But also don't let the lily pad lefties tell us that it was all the fault of the free market, because that's not true either, because it continued to rise. For 11 straight years it was $674. There was no justification for increasing it. When we had to build a new power station, I said, 'Beggar that; I'm not doing that and putting the price up,' so we decided we were going to put solar hot-water systems on every government house in Queensland, which meant I didn't have to build another power station. That's the history of Queensland. It went from $674 to $3,300 per user. If you are trying to find out what it is today, I wish you well. The last survey we took was of all of our staff and their relatives and how much each of them was paying, and it was over $3,000. They weren't paying $674. There is no justification for them paying more than $674.

Unlike everybody else in this House, I happen to know plenty about solar panels. I, in fact, was the first person in Australia to put a standalone system in, in the Torres Strait. The energy for the world came out of the opening ceremony, and I think we got the prize for science in that year—before most of you were born, 1983. But I'm a mining man, and I wanted to process and produce the solar panels here in Australia. But you must understand that your spirals separate—no energy required—but then you've got to put it under electromagnets on a conveyor belt, and they use a huge amount of electricity to clean the iron filings out. But then you've got to crush it. Silica is the second-hardest element on Earth. It's not a lot of fun to crush, I can tell you, and it's enormously costly in terms of energy and price. After you've crushed it, then you've got to smelt it. There's only one way we know on the planet to smelt. You have to have heat. Where do you get the heat from? You can get it from coal or you can get it from burning trees. I don't care what you do, but that's what you've got to do.

If you think you're going to save—and this is the magical answer, when they're only going to last 20 years. If you burn up all of that energy in producing them—well, it is a terrific solution for a new suburb up in the middle of nowhere. For Normanton, it is terrifically good. For the Torres Strait, it is terrifically good. But please don't see this as the answer. You're supposed to clean them every nine days and, really they should follow the sun every day. No panels that I know of in Australia track. They should but they don't. No-one cleans their panels, but they should. How often do you clean your windscreen? Once a fortnight you press a button and squirt water on your windscreen. That's what you should be doing to get your solar panels working properly.

I want a reduction because I represent the barrier reef, and there are very serious problems that will arise in the ocean if we increase CO2 at its present rate, but I honestly can't see a single thing that you are doing that will reduce emissions. If you think putting in solar panels is going to reduce emissions, I am sorry. I know what I'm talking about and I disagree with you. I disagree with you strongly. If you're talking about wind farms, yes, I'm a terrific supporter of the proposal in Newman. I'm most certainly not a supporter of putting them in the middle of the jungle in north Kelly.

Please listen to me. Mike Kelly was no fool. He was a colonel in the army and was Kevin Rudd's right-hand man. His family own and run Bega. They've been dairy farming this country for 260 years and they are knowledgeable people— (Time expired)

See this speech in context