Electricity Generation

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (14:31): My question is again to the Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy. Why did the minister claim that ENGIE had offered extra generation to avoid last Wednesday's power rationing, given it has said it has no gas contracts in place for the second generator, meaning it was unable to make the plant available through the bidding system under market rules agreed by the owners of AEMO ,which include the South Australian government, and also given that AEMO said to a Senate estimates committee that it did not happen?

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Treasurer, Minister for Finance, Minister for State Development, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy) (14:31): The question makes no sense, but I will try to answer it. You can buy gas on the spot market, and if you read AEMO's public pronouncements they also said that ENGIE could have put gas on the spot market. The public statement that ENGIE put out said that they have no contracts but were in negotiations and hadn't finalised contracts and that was why they were bidding in. That just shows you the confusion of the National Electricity Market when you have a generator and a market operator arguing about when they should turn on.

Meanwhile, 90,000 South Australians were without power and members opposite are arguing about who said what to whom. Really! Who said what to whom—that is their major concern rather than people being left without power. The fact is that the market they designed is broken, it doesn't work. Privatised power works in the interests of the people who own the privatised assets, not in our interests, and that is why we need to reintervene in this market. We are not going to sit by and watch private operators make more money when people are load shed than turning new generation on. It is unacceptable behaviour. Why members opposite are trying to blame us, rather than the generators and the market operator and the system that they have foisted on the people of South Australia, is beyond me.