I rise to speak on the Domestic Gas Reservation Bill 2026, the Domestic Gas Reservation (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2026 and the Domestic Gas Reservation Levy Bill 2026. Australia is one of the largest gas exporters in the global economy. We extract it from the ground, load it onto ships and send it to customers right across the globe. Yet for years Australian families and Australian businesses have watched that gas be exported while they paid more for it at home. We have been suffering from gas shortages and price shocks, but we have plenty of it here in our own backyard. That is a situation that should never have been allowed to take hold.

Aussies should have access to affordable gas, the gas this great country produces. We can reserve gas for Aussies and continue to export. We can do both. This bill establishes a domestic gas reservation scheme requiring LNG exporters to oversupply the domestic market. For the businesses and families I represent in Dickson, affordable gas is the difference between staying afloat and sinking. Gas is essential for manufacturers and businesses right across my region. It is used to grow, process and package the food that lands on supermarket shelves. It's used for processing aluminium and making glass, bricks, cement, ceramics, steel and, of course, power—that all important energy.

When gas costs more, every one of these things costs more. Everything in Australia costs more. This is not some abstract debate in a faraway gas field. It will have an impact on all Australians. For too long, gas has been treated as an asset of gas companies for them alone. These laws change that for the first time. They recognise gas resources as our country's assets. When we came to government in 2022, we walked straight into an energy crisis. A decade of the coalition umming and ahhing on energy policies, mismanagement that has made gas more expensive and left the rules governing our gas market unreliable—22 energy policies in nine and a half years. They left a gas market mess. Who remembers the gas-fired recovery that never actually arrived? Combined with global economic shocks, all this meant that prices went through the roof. There was a point where gas was being offered into our own domestic market at a price of more than $60 a gigajoule. That was simply not workable or sustainable.

The Albanese Labor government acted. We capped coal and gas prices to get families and businesses through the shock, and let me remind the House that those opposite voted against that measure. We used the tools that we had. The Gas Market Review said in its recommendations that our gas market needed fundamental reform to fix the mess, and it recommended that a national reservation scheme be at the very heart of that reform. That is what these new laws deliver.

The first of these bills, the Domestic Gas Reservation Bill 2026, is at the heart of the reform. It establishes Australia's first national domestic gas reservation scheme. Under it, our exporters will be subject to a domestic supply obligation. They will be required to contribute up to the equivalent of 20 per cent of their exports to the Australian market. The figure will be set by the Australian Energy Regulator based on what Australia actually needs at the time, with a supply buffer on top so that we hold a steady supply here at home. That means more of our own gas is supplied to our own market. More gas—more supply—will mean cheaper gas. There's been a bit of criticism about this reform. Some have asked: 'Why does this not cap our gas exports? Why does this not put a stop to our gas trade? Why are we not taxing gas?' Australia is and will remain a reliable supplier of gas to the rest of the world. Australia will keep the income and the jobs our gas exports provide to our domestic economy. What changes is simple and very much overdue: before that gas goes overseas, Australians get looked at first. We're prioritised.

The second bill, the Domestic Gas Reservation (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2026, clears out the patchwork of previously implemented measures and replaces it with one set of rules. It goes to the Gas Market Code and our competition law, and it fixes the single biggest flaw in the old system. For years, the rules only asked exporters to offer gas to Australians, not actually to sell it to us. Thanks to these bills, the obligation now is to supply real gas into the Australian market—not to offer it but to actually deliver it—and there are no loopholes to be exploited by exporters trying to dodge their obligations to supply gas into the Aussie market.

The third bill, the Domestic Gas Reservation Levy Bill 2026, makes sure that the cost of regulating the gas industry is covered by the gas industry, not the taxpayer. This means that the cost of the scheme is recovered from the companies that hold the export licences and profit from our resources.

These bills are common sense. Our gas is our national asset, so it should look after the national interest, and the companies that make their fortunes shipping it overseas should make sure our domestic market is looked after here at home. This is not antibusiness and it is not antitrade. The contracts our exporters have already signed will be honoured. We are doing all of this while maintaining Australia's reputation as a trusted trading partner with our neighbours in the Asia-Pacific region and across the globe. Australian gas will be reliable abroad and reliable here at home. It does both. That reliability is so very important, because reliability and certainty of supply is what unlocks investment potential here in Australia. When producers and large users know a steady volume of gas will be here in this market, in my electorate of Dickson, they can sign the long-term contracts that let them build new supply, new projects, new factories and importantly, the jobs that run on them.

For a manufacturer deciding whether to build here or overseas, the question is this. 'Can I count on affordable, reliable energy for the next 10 and 20 years?' This reform helps us be able to say: 'Yes. Set up shop. Build here. Build in my local industrial area of Brendale.' And the jobs that flow from that benefit our whole community—manufacturing jobs, processing jobs, jobs that aren't outsourced. They are the trades and the apprenticeships that let a young person in Moreton Bay build a career and a life close to home. Affordable energy is the foundation the rest of our economy rests on. With this bill, the Albanese Labor government backs our domestic manufacturing sector and the workers that work in it.

These new bills, these new laws, will mean that locals in my electorate of Dickson are better shielded from the next global price spike, because, when we keep more of our gas onshore, a price shock caused by conflict or some external factor on the other side of the world has far less power to reach into our suburbs and drive the energy bill up. A family running the heater through winter, a business manufacturing plastics, steel or anything like that and a manufacturer in Petrie trying to keep its people on won't be at the mercy of the global gas economy. They can be reassured that 20 per cent of our gas supplies will be held for them.

This legislation sits alongside everything else we are doing to take the weight off local power bills. Across Dickson, families have taken up our Cheaper Home Batteries Program—storing their own energy and cutting their bills. Of course our government still supports the rollout of renewables like solar and wind. The switch to renewable energy has absolutely gained pace since the Albanese Labor government came to power, but it doesn't happen overnight. We still need gas to support the rollout of renewable energy across the country while we build the renewable energy infrastructure for our future. We need gas for our domestic manufacturing industry, and we need gas to keep the heating on at home. Keeping that gas affordable and keeping it here is how we hold bills steady through the transition instead of leaving families and businesses in Dickson and around the country exposed to price shocks.

This reform does not pull us away from our climate goals; it helps us meet them. The government's own Future Gas Strategy is clear that gas has a part to play on the road to net zero by 2050. Gas is the key on our journey to net zero. We need gas to process and refine the critical minerals and rare earths that are right here in Australia. Critical minerals go into renewable energy infrastructure such as solar panels. This is another building block in a future made in Australia that's built by Australians and powered by our own resources for the benefit of all Australians. Those opposite oppose these bills. They say that, apparently, they have their own gas policy to offer. We know how that ended when they were in power for nine years, with 22 different policies and no gas recovery. As I just said, history has shown that they can't deliver. Even One Nation chose to ditch its gas policy which was hastily announced a few months ago, because they're more focused on protecting the interests of their mates rather than Australian families who actually foot the bill.

On this side of the House, we stand with ordinary Australians. We are the only party that actually cares about the everyday Australian—the ones that are struggling to pay the bills, the businesses that are driving our economy, our innovative businesses. We're securing more affordable Australian gas for Australian homes and businesses, and we're doing it to shield Aussies from the global economic shocks that they did not cause and cannot control. For too long Australians have been last in line for their own gas. These new laws will end that. There will be more Australian gas for more Australian homes and businesses—more gas and more security. I commend these bills to the House.