Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Over there, we have a bunch of Eeyores. The world's always going to end. It's always bad. It's always completely devastating. They channel Francis Ford Coppola. Their motto is not so much Apocalypse Now as 'Apocalypse soon'! 'If you do this, it's going to be just a shocker.' But you've got to address some of the comments that have been put forward by—it's hard to follow, I've got to say—the last minister for energy. I reckon he had a say in who was chosen as the shadow minister. He said, 'Find someone who's less coherent than me,' and they've managed to do it.

The safeguard mechanism that is before this parliament was introduced by the Abbott government. It's the Abbott government's model. It's not a model that we came up with. What we've done is make sure that it works. On investment, you have a plan that's supported by the Business Council of Australia, the Australian Industry Group, the Energy Users Association and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, all of whom are saying that what they want is investment certainty. They want a mechanism to be certain going forward, and that's what this provides. That's what a majority of this parliament have accepted.

I give credit to those people on the crossbenches who didn't get everything that they wanted but who had the courage to say, 'Yes; the good is better than the perfect,' from their perspective. That's why this is an achievement of this parliament. But those opposite just choose to be irrelevant to the parliament and irrelevant going forward. When in government they stood and announced 22 different energy policies but didn't land one. Even policies that went through their party room multiple times never made it to the floor, because they'd rather knock off two sitting prime ministers than actually implement a policy.

At the last election, a decisive majority of Australians voted to put an end to the delay and inaction and take action on climate policy. Australians had seen the devastating impact of climate change. It's not something that's theoretical. The bushfires and the floods—the science told us there would be more extreme weather events and they would be more intense, and that has tragically played out. There are older Australians determined to do the right thing by the next generation, farmers who know the pain and hardship of drought and young people demanding that their voices be heard. Today is a big step towards repaying that faith. Passing this legislation has put Australia on a realistic path to net zero emissions by 2050 and a 43 per cent reduction by 2030. This legislation is a big part of how we do it. What's more, what it will do is get more renewable energy, which is the cheapest form of energy, into our grid.

Overall, what it does is provide that certainty and stability that the business community have been crying out for. I want to congratulate the Minister for Climate Change and Energy and all who participated constructively, including the crossbench in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. The fact is that we had to get this done. I was elected to do this. The member said that somehow this was contrary to our policy. This is spot on our policy. It's spot on our policy, Powering Australia, which we released well before the election for all to see. The people of Australia voted for action on climate change. Today, the parliament will do the same thing.

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