James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Today, the poor long-suffering electricity consumers of my home state of South Australia have regrettably had confirmation that, if they're on the default market offer, the average household bill will go up this year by more than $500. What that means to many families in South Australia, as it does to families across the country affected by today's confirmation, is that they have to make some heartbreaking decisions about the family budget in the next 12 months. They have to decide whether or not to cancel the family holiday, which might be something they look forward to as a family every year. They have to make other sacrifices around the home, losing what's left of their discretionary ability to enjoy those comforts that are now just not affordable, because things like an electricity bill increase of more than $500 is a really significant impact on those families.

What those opposite have said to us is that those families should be grateful. They owe the Labor government their thanks for increasing bills this year by only $500. That is something that they should be applauded for, because apparently it could have been even worse than that. That is surprising because, during the election campaign that we were all pretty heavily engaged in and involved in, we all heard the now Prime Minister make a very solemn commitment to the people of this country that, if he were elected, electricity prices would fall by an average of $275. Let's be honest: that would have been quite appealing to voters. A lot of them probably wouldn't know the Prime Minister and might have thought it was a safe assumption to take him at his word, that someone who was seeking to lead the country and become Prime Minister would not say to the people of this country, 'Vote for me and I will reduce your power bill by $275,' and not mean it. That is a reasonable assumption for the people of this country, that, on something as fundamentally important as impacting the household budget, they could trust the alternative Prime Minister that he was telling the truth.

I give a shout-out to the poor old people at RepuTex. I feel for them. I don't know if they're still called RepuTex or if they're going to rebrand soon and get a new website, because they have really had it tough, thanks to their association with the now government's infamous policy and modelling to reduce prices by $275. I'm sure they really wish this would be taken down from the website and find some way of expunging any association in history with Labor policy because, of course, that costing is an absolute humiliation. That document says that, by 2025, power prices—and this was published in December 2021—compared to today, we've run the ruler over what Labor is going to do, and the good news is that the average residential power bill will fall by $275 come 2025. Now of course we have the situation where this year alone in my home state of South Australia the average power bill is going up by more than $500. There is a gaping difference now between what Labor said they would deliver and what the reality is for Australian families, and there are serious consequences with that.

As much as we have debates and make certain points in this place about the broken promise, the most important thing to the people of Australia is that they're suffering because of that broken promise. They're now having to make sacrifices and really difficult decisions in an environment where their real wages are declining at the greatest rate in my adult lifetime. On top of electricity prices, other prices are going up. Real wages are going backwards. Mortgages are going up. The price of groceries is going up. It's hard to make ends meet.

In this debate we could have the Prime Minister and others at least give an apology for what they said they would do and have subsequently not delivered. There's nothing more appalling than saying to the people of this nation, 'Vote for me and I will put this significant relief in place for your household budget,' and breaking that commitment and promise to the tune of increasing the cost that you said you would reduce. It is appalling. The people of this nation deserve an apology for that. The members of this government should acknowledge that that they have totally and utterly failed on that core promise they took to the last election.

See this speech in context