Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility Bill 2016, which is known around the traps as the 'dirty energy slush fund'. It is a huge concern that this government is going to allocate $5 billion for big dams and new coalmines in our precious north, which is famed for its natural values and much loved by its inhabitants. Study after study over many decades has shown that it is not an appropriate location, either economically or environmentally, for massive, destructive infrastructure.

It is somewhat ironic that the structure of the fund that is proposed by this government, with the support of the Labor opposition, is a concessional loan facility which, as I am sure people would know, is very similar to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation model of funding in that government stumps up some funding. It is a low-interest loan. The private sector or other bidders can use that money to invest in clean renewable energy and help Australia get on board with the global transition to clean energy.

This is a model that has been working exceedingly well, and of course it is one that this government has been attacking for as many years as we have had the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. The irony is dead, it seems, when the government wants to tear down the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and set up a dirty energy finance corporation. The inherent inconsistency, if I can be generous about it, is perhaps somehow lost on this government.

Of course they have settled for funding cuts to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation in recognition that the Senate will not let them abolish this important body that is helping our economy, our environment and our climate. Nonetheless, they seem to have now embraced that funding model, and I look forward in fact to the government increasing funding to the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, although something tells me not to hold my breath.

So this dirty energy fund would be yet another fossil fuel subsidy, and we have crunched the numbers recently—it is up to $21 billion in fossil fuel subsidies that this government hands out to coal, gas and the dirty energy sector. That is over the forward estimates—$21 billion.

There was a ReachTEL poll done just last month—a few weeks ago—which found, unsurprisingly, that almost 60 per cent of people oppose giving free money, handouts, to the fossil fuel sector in a climate emergency. Unfortunately, the government, perhaps, has missed that memo and is ignoring the majority of Australians who do not want their taxpayer money going to prop up the dirty energy sector; instead, Australians want to see that transition to clean energy with all of the jobs that it provides and with the best ability to safeguard ourselves and our environment against the ravages of climate change. Unfortunately, we have the $5 billion Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, which we know is all about big dams and coalmines.

I am particularly concerned about this, because in Queensland, where I am from, the Adani coalmine has received approval from the federal Liberal government—it has also received approval from the state Labor government. This mine would be the largest coalmine in the Southern Hemisphere—