Ellie Whiteaker (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

The town of Collie in the south-west of WA has a long and proud history as a coalmining town. In fact, generations of my own family have worked on those mines—my grandfather, my great-grandfather and my great-great-grandfather—and my dad did his sparkie apprenticeship at the Collie Power Station. Collie is a town that has kept the lights on in Western Australia for over a century. What I know about the people of Collie is that they are hardworking and they are resilient. It is that resilience that will secure the town's future. There is no denying that coal-fired power must be phased out and that it must be replaced with renewable energy, but that transition must keep jobs in the regions that have kept our country running for so long. Labor wants to ensure that, for generations to come, towns like Collie remain a place where well-paid and secure jobs can thrive.

The Cook Labor government in Western Australia has made a commitment to close the state's remaining coal-fired power stations by 2030. It was not too long ago that former prime minister Scott Morrison brought a lump of coal into the House of Representatives. It was a stunt that mocked the science and ignored what is at stake. While coal is being phased out, jobs in regional communities do not have to be, and gimmicks will not deliver the future that towns like Collie need. The future will be built by the workers and the communities who are already doing the hard work of transition.

This week, the mighty AMWU are here in Canberra to talk to us about the opportunities that exist for a clean energy future in towns like Collie. I want to acknowledge Steve McCartney, the state secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union WA, and two brilliant delegates from Collie: Daniel and Jason. They brought some lumps of Collie coal with them, a symbol of the town's history, but they also brought with them magnesium, aluminium and green steel—a clear demonstration of what the future can look like. When we talk about a renewable energy future, when we talk about the future of work, we have to ask: who is it that we're doing this for? It's for workers like Daniel and Jason and their kids and grandkids. It's for the children and the grandchildren of the residents of the great town of Collie, working families in regional communities not just in Collie but across our nation.

We have an opportunity to get this right, to support a genuinely just transition, to create new industries and new jobs into the future and to ensure that communities like Collie in my home state, towns like the one that my family have called home for many generations, are not left behind. Collie has every reason to be proud of its past and to be excited and confident in its future. What I know is that it is only a Labor government that is serious about taking action on climate, that is serious about the renewable energy transition and that is serious about securing safe, well-paid jobs for regional communities like Collie.