George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

Yes, the Minister for Finance is correct. That is why the government is taking action.

The government is taking action, and that is why we discussed the matter at great length, as I explained to you in answer to Senator Farrell's question earlier on. Doing nothing is not an option. At least, surely, all of us in this chamber can agree to that one proposition? If we do nothing, electricity prices and energy prices generally will continue to rise. So, whichever party may be in government at any given time, they must take action and they must take action without further delay. This government has shown that it is up for that challenge. First of all, what we have done, along with the other COAG jurisdictions, was to commission Alan Finkel, the Chief Scientist, to produce a report. When the report was received by government it was immediately made public. That was last Friday. And we arranged for there to be a briefing on the Finkel report by the minister, Mr Frydenberg, yesterday. Following that briefing, we had a long and interesting discussion in our party room.

The government will move forward on this matter, because to do nothing is not an option. Therefore, delay is not an option. As I said in answer to your colleague, in the policy choices we will make we will be informed by those three objectives of keeping electricity prices affordable; ensuring reliability of supply, so we do not have writ large across the country the fiasco that the South Australian Labor government subjected us to when the entire state was blacked out; and we will keep our international emissions reduction commitments as well.