Louise Pratt (WA, Australian Labor Party) | Hansard source

What a ridiculous motion it is that has been put forward by Senator Hanson today. Of course we, as a government, listen to super funds, our nation's biggest investors. They are custodians of our biggest investment portfolios and custodians of Australians' retirement savings. Of course we listen to industry superannuation companies. Of course we listen to unions. The truth is that it is those opposite, the coalition and One Nation, who are not listening—not listening to communities, not listening to scientists about climate change, not listening to industry and not listening to workers.

Let's take, for example, this nuclear fantasy of the opposition leader, Mr Dutton: seven nuclear reactors at the sites of existing or former coal-fired power stations around the nation, including in my own home state of WA, near Collie, at the site of Muja Power Station. What we have in the coalition's nuclear power plan is a plan that will throw our emissions targets in the bin. It is a plan that will divert investment from cheaper, shovel-ready renewable electricity generation projects. They will simply be put in the bin under this kind of proposal, because it will divert investment and waste precious time—precious time that industry super funds, the Business Council of Australia and workers in these communities right around Australia know that we don't have, and precious time that we must spend getting on with the job of committing to and implementing a transition to renewable energy.

Even if you were a climate change denier, the truth is that the coalition's nuclear power plan is still slower and more expensive than the energy plans already in place. The coalition admit that coal-fired power is coming to an end by the end of the decade, yet at the same time they want to wait decades for nuclear reactors which will cost more than renewable energy can be built for today.

Take the community of Collie in Western Australia, for example. They already have a plan to manage the transition from coal through the Collie Just Transition working group. It is a place where government bodies, unions, business and local community organisations have all come together to produce the plan to manage the end of coal power in the community of Collie. It's critical for our whole state, the state of WA, that they be given a chance to get this right and to do this job, because without it the electricity reliability of our whole state is in jeopardy. That is what those opposite seek to do: jeopardise the power future of the whole state of Western Australia. Collie Just Transition have a plan in place that calls for investment in renewable energy, retraining programs and embedded consultation with the local community. They have new industries that they are working with. They are working today to replace the jobs that will go when coal-fired power closes by the end of the decade, in 2029. The community of Collie cannot wait until 2040.

So the motion before us today names something, frankly, that is patently obvious. Of course as a good Labor government we're working with industry super funds, with unions and with communities to protect our nation's future.