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

I thank my honourable friend for the question and thank her for everything she does representing her community so well. I'm pleased to inform the House that 110,022 Australian households have now taken up the Albanese government's Cheaper Home Batteries Program, up around 2,000 since yesterday—Australians getting on with the job of reducing their emissions and their bills.

But, of course, we know that there's much more to do, and that's why today the Albanese government has announced our latest reforms to energy pricing in Australia, particularly the introduction of Solar Sharer, which will see a compulsion on energy companies to deliver an option for their consumers in default market offer states of having a free power period in the middle of the day. We can do this because 4.2 million Australian houses have rooftop solar, which means there's plenty of cheap and often negative-price power in the system during the day, and that has not been passed on to consumers as much as we would like. So we will require energy companies to offer this.

Think about the opportunities for someone working from home, for example. People working from home will always have the support of this side of the House. Those people will be able to shift their energy use, in some instances, to the middle of the day and know it is for free with no charge coming. Or think about a retired couple, a pensioner couple, living at home who can know that, between maybe 12 and three, their energy will be free. Or think about someone with an app that can control their power. They can schedule their dishwasher or washing machine to operate free of charge in the middle of the day. These are important, meaningful reforms that put Australians more in charge and deliver cost-of-living relief. That's what real reform looks like—important reforms to ensure that consumers are put first.

The member asked me what threats there would be and what an unreliable source of energy would be. We know, of course, that the most unreliable source of energy in the Australian grid at the moment is coal fired power, with coal-fired power stations breaking down all the time. We've had some revelations from those opposite in recent days—not only about net zero but about the National Party announcing that they support building new coal-fired power stations. The leader of the Nats said that one of the ways we can reduce emissions is to build new coal-fired power stations.

The leader of the Nats says that was Page. Well, he did refer to the Page report, which was the National Party report that he called 'crucial'. To justify this, the Page report says:

Independent modelling by Arche Energy found that an ultra-supercritical coal plant could supply electricity …

Now, when I look at this independent modelling, what does it say? The report by Arche Energy says:

This report is written solely for the benefit of Coal Australia.

That's what the independent modelling is—solely for the benefit of Coal Australia—and they assume a coal price of $40 to $60 when actually the coal price is over $100. I might assume I'll look like George Clooney next year, but it doesn't mean it's going to happen. You can't just assume your way to cheaper energy prices; you need to deliver policies for it.

See this speech in context