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

Senator Di Natale, I reject every single premise of your question. As I said in response to the two questions I've received from the opposition already, what this government is committed to is a pragmatic set of policies designed to serve the twin objectives of keeping electricity prices as low as possible and ensuring reliability of supply. And the way we're going to do that, as I and my colleagues have told you endless times this year, is to adopt a technology-agnostic approach. We know that the Australian people, electricity consumers, are not interested in Greens' ideology. They're not interested in ideology at all. What they're interested in is in ensuring supply is reliable and power is affordable. And that—and only that—will guide the policy choices this government makes.

Senator Di Natale, among the many premises in your question—which is false and which I disputed—is the assertion that electricity prices have doubled under this government. Have a look at the ACCC's figures that were published this morning which demonstrate that the price of electricity spiked and underwent its sharpest increase during the period of the previous Labor government—when the Labor Party was enslaved to your obsession with resolving this issue according to ideology rather than economics and practical common sense. We are not going to make that mistake. We are going to adopt, as I said before, a technology-agnostic approach; we're going to adopt whatever policies will put downward pressure on prices and ensure the reliability of supply.