Julie-Ann Campbell (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) | Hansard source

When you want something to work—when you want to shape it and when you want to have a stake in it—you can't bury your head in the sand. You can't close your eyes and pretend it isn't already happening. AI isn't coming soon. AI isn't a vision that's for the future. AI is here, and, because it's here, we now have a very important question that we need to answer. What is our role, not just as a government or as a country but as every single Australian, in that AI journey? I thank the member for Warringah for that question, because it's incredibly important. It's something that people are talking about in communities across our nation, and it's something that this Labor government is acting on right now.

In December last year, this Albanese Labor government announced the National AI Plan. That plan has three really clear goals. The first is to capture the opportunities, and the opportunities are many. We know that there are huge opportunities in terms of making the economy grow. We know that there are enormous opportunities in terms of productivity. We know that there are big opportunities in the aftermarket of data centres and AI. The second is that we have to share in the benefits. The benefits are many, but those benefits need to flow into everyday Australians every day. The third is to keep Australians safe, because we know that disinformation and misinformation are things that people are concerned about in our local communities, and we must protect Australians from them.

When there is a big digital transition like this and infrastructure is rolling out, we have to be in the ring. But we have to be in the ring with some conditions. The first is that, when it comes to data centres, we need them to reflect our Australian values. We need to ensure that our values as a nation are implemented when we talk about rollout, and we also need to ensure that those data centres are advancing Australia's interests and our people's interests.

I know that data centres have been something that have been very hotly contested, not just here but across the globe. For some people it's a new age. It's the new industrial revolution. It's something that's big and exciting. For others they're big, gargantuan sheds that suck energy. The truth is, when we decide our role in this space, we need to make sure that we account for all those arguments and set a framework to ensure that our country gets the best out of these. That's why in late March, the government's data centre expectations were rolled out. It's why what we set were some very clear expectations that you've got to bring your own supply, that you've got to cover your grid connection costs and that you have to co-operate with market operators to strengthen the energy grid.

This is not about moving forward at any cost. It's about making sure that, when these critical decisions are made and that economic impact rolls in, we are not passengers. We cannot be price takers. We cannot be people who sit on this side of the world and aren't in the game for the benefit of everyday Australians. Instead, what we must do is ensure that data centre providers pull their weight. Instead, what we must do is make sure that, as the scale-up happens, workers are supported and are not casualties of this work. We must make sure that there are frameworks for community engagement, because the concerns that people raise around water and energy are legitimate. The way to address those concerns is to set clear expectations for what we need as a country when it comes to data centres.

We want to be masters of our own destiny in this place. We don't want to bury our head in the sand on this, and we have a choice. That choice is for an Albanese Labor government to ensure that we are.

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