Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Hansard source

I thank my honourable friend for the question. It was of course in her now electorate that the Prime Minister and I announced the Cheaper Home Batteries policy during the recent federal election campaign. It was a great day—although the member for Griffith and I were both wearing Cheaper Home Batteries T-shirts, and the combination of renewable energy and a T-shirt would be particularly triggering for the Leader of the Opposition! But I digress.

I am happy to report to the House that, since we announced that policy, 104,900 Australians have introduced a cheaper home battery into their house or their small business. That's 104,900 households and small businesses that are reducing their bills and their emissions. It's a similar story across the country. Again, I'll update the House on AEMO's quarterly figures, which were released today, that show the highest renewable penetration in quarter 3 in Australian history and energy prices down 27 per cent, year on year, and 38 per cent, quarter on quarter, in a wholesale term. This is good progress. It is good step forward, with much more to do.

The member for Griffith asked me what policies might threaten this progress. Of course, we've been seeing a lot of them over the course of this week. The member for Wannon released a bit of a policy update in the House during the week. He said that his approach as energy minister would be to sweat the coal assets for longer and he called for us to keep the coal-fired power stations working harder and longer, apparently unaware that as of today there are 11 separate coal-fired power units out of action, broken down, not working—3.6 gigawatts. These are unreliable units. They are now the biggest threat to reliability in our energy system, and those opposite want to see them working longer and harder. We want to see appropriate investment to see them replaced, to see them in due course, in an orderly transition, replaced with new energy for the future, so that those communities that have powered Australia for so long can power us into the future.

Of course it's a big day for the opposition tomorrow. They will be having their big meeting, their big love-in, their big briefing about net zero. We had a contribution overnight from the former Treasurer, energy minister, home affairs minister, health minister and industry minister of the Morrison government in one LinkedIn post by Scott Morrison, saying that they should move away from net zero. This just shows us that the Liberal Party hasn't changed. The man who stood at this dispatch box and held up a lump of coal is now telling them that it's okay to move away from net zero. They haven't learnt. They haven't got the memo from the Australian people or from the 104,000 households that are getting on with the job. I'm sure another thousand households tomorrow and another thousand households on Monday will install a cheaper home battery with support from the Albanese Labor government.

We are transitioning this economy and this energy system to make it fit for the future, while those opposite are stuck in their denial and delay.

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