Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction) Share this | Hansard source

The first issue I'd like to speak on today is the offshore wind farm off the coast of Warrnambool and Port Fairy. As the Minister for Climate Change and Energy, Chris Bowen, knows, my community does not want this offshore wind farm placed right next to a whale-breeding zone—a breeding zone of a whale which is on the extinction list, as a matter of fact. Minister Bowen said last week, when he was asked a question by me in the parliament, 'If an application is in the wrong place, it wouldn't be approved, whether it's renewable energy or anything else. That's how it should be.' Well, I say to Minister Bowen that now you have made it very clear in the parliament that that is your view—that is, you've said it under oath in the parliament—we look forward to you acting on it.

As you know, and as the Minister knows, there was no environmental study done before he placed this zone off the coast of Warrnambool and Port Fairy. They didn't do any sort of assessment of what the potential environmental impacts might be, whether those be on whales or sea birds. Instead, he just plonked this offshore wind farm zone off the coast of Port Fairy and Warrnambool and didn't do due diligence with regard to consultation with the community. As we found out through FOI requests, his department said to him, 'You need to be very careful about doing this,' for exactly the reasons that we want it stopped. The environmental consequences will be significant if he goes ahead with this, as will the economic consequences because, as we are finding out right across the globe, offshore wind is expensive. It's one of—if not the most—expensive forms of energy anywhere. We have already seen electricity bills go up by 39 per cent under this government, while emissions have flatlined—so you've got a double whammy policy which is failing on your cost of living and failing on doing anything about emissions. How can this Minister still be in his job—seriously?

More importantly or just as important, he's now putting offshore wind farms in places where they have no right to be. As you've said, it's quite clear they shouldn't go in areas where they will have a significant impact on biodiversity. Let's hear you practice what you preach, Minister Bowen. Let's scrap this offshore wind farm once and for all and keep my constituents, especially around Warrnambool and Port Fairy, happy.

It's hard to believe, but the fire season is upon us. Fortunately, in western Victoria—even though we'd had a very tough period of 12 to 18 months of very dry weather—we have seen good rain over the last two to three months. We've seen good grass growth. But what that means is, as a community, we now have to get ready for the summer. We obviously had the devastating bushfires in the Grampians last summer, so we are fully aware of the dangers of bushfires in western Victoria. We have to prepare for this coming summer.

Obviously, as the Country Fire Authority knows, especially those wonderful volunteers, we have to be fire ready. So I say this to everyone who is still a volunteer member of the CFA—and the Victorian state government have done everything they can to turn people away in their hundreds. To those who still are, like I am: it's time to do your minimum skills training. And, if you're a landholder, it's time to make sure that you've done the preparatory work to be able to protect your property from fire, because, whether we like it or not, Christmas is coming at us at a million miles, and we've got to make sure we do what we always have to do in the country—prepare for the summer fire season. So get yourself ready, and, if you still volunteer, make sure that you've got your minimum skills so, if we get the worst, we can make sure that we're there taking action to protect our communities.

I've been travelling around my electorate the last few weeks, doing listening posts and trying to hear what is of concern to my constituents. As I spoke of yesterday in this parliament, roads—the state of the roads and the number of potholes, which continues to increase—are the No. 1 concern.

But it's followed closely by the cost of living. People are saying to me, how can they deal with the cost of groceries; how can they deal with the cost of insurance; and how can they deal with the cost of electricity, which has gone up by 39 per cent, and the cost of gas, which has gone up by over 20 per cent? They want some sort of relief, and all they're seeing at the moment is a continuation in the fall in their living standards. They're starting to know and understand that Australia has seen the biggest fall in living standards of any country in the OECD. When you put these cost pressures, which show no sign of ending, on top of that, people are hurting.

My message to the Prime Minister is: it's all well and good, doing what you're doing overseas, but you have to have a laserlike focus on what is happening on the ground here in Australia, and the cost of living remains a key concern to people. I will continue to hold you to account for the fact that my communities are continuing to struggle with the cost of living, because nothing your government is doing is seeking to ease those cost-of-living pressures, and people want them addressed.

One of the great days on my calendar every year is when I host the Wannon Sport and Volunteer Awards. People are nominated from right across the wonderful Wannon electorate, and they come together. We always do it the same way: we do the wonderful people who volunteer in and around our sporting clubs and then the wonderful people who volunteer for our community organisations. We'll usually get 250 or 300 people at both the morning and the afternoon events. You hear the stories of what people who volunteer in our communities do, and it never ceases to amaze me. It is the most humbling day on my calendar right throughout the year. These people don't want any credit for what they do—they don't want the accolades; they don't want the applause—but, when you're able to recognise them, you can just see the joy that it brings to them because they absolutely love what they do, and they love what they do because they love their communities. That just shines out.

I'll be hosting my sport and volunteer awards again in November. I can't wait. We've got wonderful, wonderful nominations from right across the electorate again, and I say to everyone who has been nominated that I can't wait to see you on the day. I can't wait to be able to congratulate you for everything that you've done for our wonderful communities because you've earnt and deserve that recognition. This is a small way that our communities can say a huge thank you to you, because, without volunteers, our country communities wouldn't be as strong as they are—and they're as strong as any community in Australia. As a matter of fact, I would say we are stronger because I think our ethos of volunteering is stronger. So a huge thank you, and I look forward to seeing you soon.

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