Motions

Diesel Generator Evidence

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (11:31): Thank you to the house for the indulgence of allowing this motion to be considered. I move:

That evidence regarding the state government's procurement of diesel generators, that was heard in camera by the Public Works Committee on 10 August 2017, be made public.

Members would be aware that the consideration by the Public Works Committee of the installation of hybrid turbines as a long-term backup power plant, which was reported to the parliament on 15 August 2017, was subsequent to the work and inquiry of the Public Works Committee, chaired by member for Elder.

The members for Mount Gambier, Colton, Unley and Torrens were represented and took evidence on that occasion. For the purposes of that hearing, they received a submission from the Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy, dated 2 August 2017. Curiously, there was nothing presented directly, by any written submission, from the Department of the Premier and Cabinet in relation to what is normally a departmental submission; in this case, it would be the portfolio responsibility of Energy.

Nevertheless, what I would call a political pamphlet was prepared as a submission from Mr Koutsantonis, and that was the written submission that was relied upon for the purpose of consideration. Additionally, evidence was given by five members of the Department of the Premier and Cabinet, led by Mr Sam Crafter, the executive director of the Energy Plan Implementation, and one representative from SA Power Networks in relation to some work that had been undertaken by the SA Power Networks on behalf of the government and who were going to have an ongoing role in this project. Remember, this was a project that the government announced as part of a planned recovery to deal with the haemorrhaging energy provision in this state, both its reliability and cost.

In that evidence, a request was made and accepted by the committee that matters of financial aspects in particular should be heard and received and questions asked by the committee. The documents that were presented for consideration were not only mercifully thin, I suppose, but did not have any of that material in them. Questions were requested to be asked, obviously, on a confidential basis and in camera.

My understanding, from the material published on the website by the committee—and, of course, the report has been tabled in the parliament together with the submissions that were made and the transcript taken—is that all other evidence received, that is oral submissions from witnesses to the committee, was not transcribed. What I am advised now is that essentially this further material and questioning was not recorded by Hansard. Essentially, the representatives from Hansard, at the request of the committee chair, vacate the room; that is, they do not even take it down.

I do not know the answer to that. If that is the case, I will say to the parliament that I would be utterly appalled and disgusted if that has occurred; that is, that the information from witnesses—whilst the committee agreed to hear it in camera for maybe quite legitimate reasons—has not even been recorded at all. That would be most disturbing.

I can understand if an interim decision is made by a committee to hold certain aspects confidential until they give them further consideration, or until there is any further determination or adjudication about it, particularly by this parliament. After all, that is what the committee is there to do. It is there to conduct inquiries and report back to the parliament for the very purpose of giving us guidance, in this instance, in respect of major contracts for infrastructure that are under consideration by the government. We need to have some confidence that that is occurring.

I make this point: if in fact it turns out that the further information that was presented, either in the form of documents or oral evidence by witnesses to the committee, was not retained or recorded, then that is a very serious matter. It is a matter that I suggest any future parliament—obviously, it is our last day—should take into very serious consideration. It is information that should not just be destroyed. It should not just evaporate. It may need to be called upon at a later time. It may be needed purely for the purposes of identifying the bona fides of information that is disclosed at a certain time, as distinct from the accuracy of the information that is provided.

I am deeply disturbed by the assertion that there is no other evidence in existence. It has either not been recorded or, if it was received in any document form, it has not been retained by the committee. In courts of law, there would be offences punishable by imprisonment potentially for shredding evidence. I am not asserting that at this point. I just make the point that I consider the destruction, disposal or non-retention of material that is under consideration, in this case by the Public Works Committee, to be a completely unacceptable practice. If that is the case, I will certainly pursue this matter next year.

On the other hand, other material may have been retained and is in the possession of the committee secretary or the like for the purposes of bringing it back. For example, if in such a project there is any change of condition—which we now know there has been under this particular project; the government have purported to sign other documents that will change the nature of the implementation of this project—under the terms of reference of the Public Works Committee—that change of course needs to be brought back to the committee.

Whether the Public Works Committee continues to receive that material, or even asks for it from the government to be continued to be considered, even between now and the resumption of parliament, which a number of our committees do as they continue to undertake their good work obviously outside of parliament sitting and can make their reports available, I would expect not only would they need to have retained that material but, if they have, then I ask this parliament to agree to make it available.

Secondly, it certainly should be made available for the purposes of the committee, which, of course, can change in composition because we now know the parliament has determined that the member for Mount Gambier is no longer a member of that committee. I think the member for Flinders is now a member of that committee and he would not have been present of course in the August hearings in respect of this application.

That would be another important reason regarding that material—if it has not been destroyed or not retained in the first place, that is, not recorded in the first place for the purpose of oral submissions—as he will clearly be at a disadvantage in respect of being able to understand the background of the first report of this project. For a lot of projects, they come in, they are considered, witnesses attend and provide extra material, and there is a determination after consideration by the committee. It then comes to the parliament and we might discuss it. The government moves on and actually implements a number of these anyway, irrespective of what the Public Works Committee says, actually. Nevertheless, that is the usual process.

A number of these do not come back onto the agenda of the Public Works Committee, but we now know, from the government's own admission, that it is proposing to change the terms of this arrangement to apparently bring forward the acquisition of the capital works in question. We have never seen the contract: we are told we are not allowed to see it, and we are told that we are not even allowed to know what it is going to cost. I am ever hopeful that the Public Works Committee will be able to do its job and that committee members will have that material in front of them so that they can give it due consideration.

I would be expecting that committee, given the government's announcement, to have convened another meeting—if they have not already done so—to ensure that they are reviewing the next stage of this amended proposal by the government. We want open, transparent consideration by the committee. We as a parliament rely on that committee for the purpose of ensuring that capital works are following proper process, and that they are a good use of public money, etc.

Most members understand the reason why we have a Public Works Committee: it is very valuable to the parliament and it ought to be a transparent process to give assurance to the parliament that the government's nominated expenditure—which is all a secret to the rest of us at the moment—is something of value, is value for money, and further, that if it is amended, it will be given appropriate scrutiny. For all those reasons, I ask the parliament to support this resolution.

In the event that there is a response from the committee stating that there is no evidence, other than what has been published, that exists for the purpose of production to public, that will be a matter I will raise next year. If there is, with the passage of this resolution, then I would ask that it be made available, either by being placed on the website and/or the provision of electronic or hard copies to the parliament forthwith.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL (Cheltenham—Premier, Minister for the Arts) (11:42): I rise to oppose the proposition that has been advanced by the member for Bragg. Yesterday, the member for Bragg, in something that has become characteristic of her contributions, overreached in the most extreme fashion. She was attacking the South Australian government's decision to purchase a publicly owned state power plant, and she did so in extreme terms. She did so in a fashion which has served to elevate the question of the privatisation of power assets into this state as the key political issue that will be debated at the next state election. For that, I am sure she will have the undying gratitude of her side of the house.

The Leader of the Opposition instinctively became aware of the risk associated with this, and so he went out soon after the deputy leader and sought to try to slightly crab walk away from the proposition that was put very firmly on the table by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition when she was squarely asked the question: would you rule out privatising an asset? She would not; she said it would have to abide the judicial inquiry. So what the Leader of the Opposition then had to do was walk out and suggest, 'We don't to sell it; it's not our wish to sell it.' He did not fundamentally change the position, but he could see the political risk to which the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had exposed the opposition.

That risk is this: the next election will be a referendum on the privatisation of the state-owned power plant—nothing more, nothing less. That will be our mantra from this day until 17 March. There is no escaping it. They are locked and loaded on this question. You can squirm and try to get out of this any way you like, but the Deputy Leader of the Opposition has locked and loaded those on the other side of the chamber to a privatisation agenda. She has done that because the Liberal Party are attracted to privatisation like a moth is attracted to the light. It is instinctively in their DNA. Whenever there is a public policy challenge, the Liberal Party reach for the private market. The Liberal Party put their faith in large, powerful interests—the large, powerful interests that govern the Liberal Party. They will always whistle up the Liberal Party to dance to their tune and they have done so again.

When there was a massive challenge here in South Australia, as there was around the blackout and the subsequent load-shedding event, back on 8 February, the South Australian Labor Party in government consulted its values and constructed a public policy response which was about putting the public interest first and using the power of the state to actually exercise its authority on behalf of its citizens.

What did the Liberal Party do? They looked at our plan. They could not think; they were paralysed for six months—in fact, nine months—and when they ultimately came up with an idea what did they reach for? They reached for a very long extension cord to New South Wales and they reached for the private sector to own and supply the backup power that was necessary. This demonstrates more clearly than any other public policy issue the poverty and emptiness of the policy formulation process of those opposite. It also demonstrates that at a critical moment in the politics of this state the member for Bragg is always there throwing a spanner in the works and upending the Liberal Party strategy.

Do not ask me about this: ask the Leader of the Opposition why he was out there crab walking away from the Deputy Leader of the Opposition's remarks? Because he saw the political risk. He must have been thinking, 'Thank you, member for Bragg.' Imagine the look on his face when he heard that the Deputy Leader of the Opposition had raced out there, elbowed the member for Stuart out of the way—and that requires some doing—almost pulled a hamstring getting out there before the Leader of the Opposition could get out there, wanting to make some political point.

Of course, they put the poor old Hon. Rob Lucas in a closet because they did not want him emerging because he had his fingerprints all over the privatisation contract—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: And his signature.

The Hon. J.W. WEATHERILL: —and his signature—and then they sheepishly rolled him out at the end of the day to actually promote some non sequitur because the Minister for Energy was a bit unkind to him during the day.

This is a central issue in the next state election campaign, and we are grateful to the Deputy Leader of the Opposition racing out there a few days ago and making it such. We are grateful to her for moving the resolution that she has just moved to get this particular notice of motion on the books so that we can spend time exploring this question in great detail, because you are going to be hearing an enormous amount about this between now and the next state election.

The next state election will be about these issues: the privatisation of South Australia's publicly owned state power plant, the scrapping of the 50 per cent renewable energy target that the South Australian government supports and, finally, energy self-sufficiency, South Australians taking control of their own energy future and putting the control of the energy sector in public hands.

Mr PISONI (Unley) (11:49): The important issue that is being canvassed here today is not about privatisation, it is not about state-owned assets—that is what the government wants it to be about. At the last election, I do not remember a single negative campaign from the Labor Party about the sale of ETSA by a previous government because electricity was not an issue; it was not the issue back then that it is now. The only thing that has changed since the last election is that this government has mismanaged the transition into renewable energy—

The Hon. J.M. Rankine interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Wright is called to order.

Mr PISONI: For ideological reasons alone, and to try to get a political advantage that they misjudged because they sent prices through the roof and reliability of electricity to the ground, they closed the Northern power station prematurely. Remember? The Northern power station could have been kept open for $8 million a year of which about $3 million would have been returned in state taxes, namely, payroll tax and other taxes, royalties and so forth that the mine and the power plant were paying to the state government. It was a very sensible offer.

The technology for renewable energies needed to catch up before we switched off the coal-fired plant at Port Augusta. But, no, this government wanted to pound its chest and say, 'Look at me, look at me. Look what we have done here in South Australia.' They wanted to tell the world. They wanted to be world leaders in renewable energy. They did not care about the consequences; they were only interested in any political advantage, but that backfired. Now, all of a sudden we see the government's solution costing more than half a billion dollars, much of which goes into the purchase of what is a temporary power plant.

These power plants are leased all over the world. The Public Works Committee was told that this power plant is a temporary power plant. Never anywhere in the world has it been used for a permanent solution. South Australia is going into another experiment in electricity provision. We do not need to take on all the risk in South Australia. You need to be in a very desperate position to be a client of this company for temporary power sources.

Its own brochure was supplied to the Public Works Committee via the Treasurer in his capacity as Minister for Energy. Algeria is a customer. Greece is a customer—and Greece is a lovely place but, boy, it is going through some economic problems at the moment. Angola is another country that is a customer of this power plant supplier, and Egypt is another. South Australia is in great company as a customer of GE for their temporary power plants, and nowhere else in the world has it been used as a permanent solution—another first for South Australia, another massive risk, hundreds of millions of dollars, to taxpayers here in South Australia.

What was the real motivation to committing to purchasing a power station before you have even turned it on? You have a lease arrangement in place for up to two years—a lease arrangement in place for 13 months, and then for another 12 months after that as an option—but instead, before you have even turned the thing on, you have signed up to purchase it. I will tell you what the motivation is: so that this government can invent a campaign in the lead-up to the election that is about buying back the farm. They have bought a temporary power station that provides a fraction of the power that South Australia needs, and they are going to say that they have bought that.

As I said in an earlier contribution, too much taxpayers' money is not enough money as far as this government is concerned to try to save its hide. It needs to create an illusion of action out there in the community. People know how badly this government has run the energy portfolio in South Australia. What is interesting is the trail of destruction that the Treasurer leaves behind him.

When he ran urban development, we had Gillman and the Festival Plaza, both with damning reports, one of which even came back from ICAC. Now we have had to spend hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers' money that we did not have to spend because of an ideological journey and some political pointscoring that this Treasurer and this government were more interested in delivering than an outcome for South Australians.

The early signing of this contract is a massive variation to the conditions that were presented to the Public Works Committee, so I will be calling for a new hearing of the committee so that we can examine the reasons for the early signing of this purchase document. It was not what the Public Works Committee was told. We were told that what we were receiving was what was approved by cabinet, yet just a month later we hear that the government has changed its mind. This government owes South Australians an opportunity to get an understanding of what the benefits of this premature signing of this document are, and the best way of doing that is through a public hearing of the Public Works Committee.

We all know that the Public Works Committee is controlled by the government of the day. Of course, the government of the day is the Labor Party. They have three votes on that committee and the Liberal Party have two votes, so it really is not up to those committee members—

The Hon. P. Caica: And you only come to meetings when you think you can politicise it. I didn't see you there this morning. I didn't see you there last week.

The SPEAKER: The member for Colton is called to order for commenting on the regularity of the member for Unley's attendance.

Mr PISONI: —it is up to the Labor Party and the Premier himself as to whether they agree to open up the hearings into this power plant. This is one of the biggest capital expenditures that has gone through the Public Works Committee in a very long time. It is an enormous amount of money, hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. It is a challenge for this government to agree for the Public Works Committee to reopen the examination into the temporary come permanent solution, as described by this government, of the power plant purchase and the changes to the arrangements that were spelt out to the Public Works Committee not much more than a month ago.

Ms Chapman: Excellent—here is the one who actually sold ETSA.

The Hon. M.L.J. HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite—Minister for Investment and Trade, Minister for Small Business, Minister for Defence and Space Industries, Minister for Health Industries, Minister for Veterans' Affairs) (11:57): No, actually, you were the president of the Liberal Party, I think, at the time, Vickie, or just before it.

The SPEAKER: No, I was never the president of the Liberal Party.

The Hon. M.L.J. HAMILTON-SMITH: Well, the deputy leader was and it was in fact her party that sold ETSA, just to clarify the facts. I do want to make a contribution to this debate because I have the unique viewpoint of having seen it from both sides of the house. I remember the Keating reforms and the Keating proposal to form a national electricity market and to undertake significant infrastructure reform, and I think that was the right decision.

I remember being a candidate in the 1997 election when promises were made that ETSA would not be sold, then I do recall the party room meeting soon after where it was put to us that ETSA would be sold, and I was a bit surprised.

Mr van Holst Pellekaan: How did you vote?

The Hon. M.L.J. HAMILTON-SMITH: I can tell you: I supported it. I supported it for two reasons. I supported it with some reservation, but with two assurances. One was that the regulatory regime that would be put in place would give South Australians confidence that the big end of town, the big multinationals, would not rip them off, drive prices up in order to grab profits and drive small business and households into the ground. There was an absolute assurance that the regulatory regime that was designed at the time under the guidance of the then treasurer, the Hon. R.L. Lucas in another place, would ensure that would not happen.

The SPEAKER: R.I. Lucas, I think.

The Hon. M.L.J. HAMILTON-SMITH: R.I., is it? Whatever.

The SPEAKER: Robert Ivan.

The Hon. M.L.J. HAMILTON-SMITH: The other assurance that we in the party room were given at the time was that there would be renewed interconnection, that there would be a second interconnector to New South Wales, Riverlink, and that the interconnection would ensure that competition was maintained so that, again, there would be no gouging of businesses or households by the multinationals that were buying this entity.

I must say that a trade sale was not the option that I favoured as a newly arrived backbencher in the party room. I put to then premier John Olsen and Lucas an alternative. My preferred alternative would have been a 49 per cent float, Telstra 1-2 style. I went further, I am quite happy to say so, and thought that a better way for us to proceed as a state would have been to combine ETSA and SA Water into a major utility and float 49 per cent of that only through an IPO to the share market, with the government to retain 51 per cent.

The reason I put that argument to the party room and the then premier and treasurer was that I felt we would create, in effect, another Santos. We would create a large public utility that was 51 per cent owned by the people of South Australia through their government, but we would free up 49 per cent of that capital value through an IPO to be sold to Australian superannuation funds, preferably to Australians in the first instance. We would have created far more capital, in my opinion, than what we did raise, which I think was in the order of around $6 billion, through a trade sale.

I did not favour the trade sale option. I did not think that it kept ownership of the entity sufficiently in public hands. That was a pretty radical proposal for a newly arrived backbencher to make in a government of the day, and it was not accepted. The feeling was that a trade sale of ETSA alone would basically generate more money. The party room agreed to that proposition on the basis that the regulatory regime and the interconnection would be assured. At a later point in the debate—it was a fairly long and turgid debate—the interconnection option was dispensed with. The additional interconnection never occurred.

There was no doubt in my mind, as a member of the party room, that the reason for that was that additional interconnection would have turned the price down. We would not have received as good a price for it with the additional interconnection, but what we would have had was a guarantee that prices would not be gouged and there would be greater flexibility on the grid. I was disappointed with that decision, but by then we were locked onto a pathway from which there was no return.

The further concern that I and others had was that the regulatory regime would not be robust enough to ensure sufficient competition within the network, but, again, the party was on a pathway from which it could not return. In the end, as we all know, two members crossed the floor in the other place, the matter was agreed to and the thing went ahead on the basis of it being a trade sale, with the interconnection not being provided and, in my opinion, with inadequate regulatory arrangements having been put in place. I voted for that. In fact, I was supposed to be away at the time, and I had to come back to be here to vote for that. It was very close. That is what you do when your party goes down a pathway from which there is no return.

I still think that, in principle, having these assets in private hands is the right thing to do. I am not sure if it would have worked out any better if we had just kept ownership of ETSA as we have, but what I have observed is that the whole thing has gone pear-shaped. I think that everyone observed that in the years that followed. I just want to dispel a couple of absolute myths, and one is that renewable energy is the problem. In my opinion, renewable energy is the solution.

I accept that the regulatory regime we have is a national regime and the state has an ability to influence it through the relevant council of ministers, but one of the problems with it is that it is not sufficiently flexible to enable renewables to adequately play their role within the grid. We saw that demonstrated recently during the challenges we faced in the last year or two. When the grid is suddenly disrupted through a weather event, we need to be confident that the gas turbines that are the backup for renewables are able to swing into play very swiftly indeed. That is why the Treasurer has made the decisions he has made about getting battery storage into the network and establishing additional, quickly accessible gas and diesel-driven generation capability.

We need a regulatory regime that is extremely flexible and agile, and we need capabilities like battery storage and immediate gas or diesel backup that can swing into action in minutes rather than hours in order to fill the gap when the wind stops blowing, the sun stops shining or there is a major weather event that causes a disruption to the system. That is something that the regulatory system at a national level should have required, and it did not. The national regulatory system is stuffed, and, as a consequence, the state has been left with no alternative but to take the actions it has taken.

I must say that I listened to the quality of the debates when I was in the Liberal party room on this subject. I have now listened to the quality of the debates in the Labor government cabinet on this subject, and I must say there is daylight between the two parties in terms of the quality of the arguments, the evidence that has been given and the consideration that has been put into arriving at the decisions taken.

It is not a perfect grid, it is not a perfect national system, and we do not live in a perfect world, but I note that every state in the country is experiencing similar problems to us. Prices are going up everywhere; even in those states where the assets are predominantly still government-owned there are significant issues both on price and reliability of supply. We are now in the hands of multinationals who are closing down coal-burning capabilities station after station and who, I have no doubt, are gouging us on price. I would love to know what return on investment the people who bought our assets have made, after they purchased them in the late 1990s. I reckon they would have paid it off in droves by now and be well into the black.

The responsibility the government has—and it is a responsibility that the Premier and the Treasurer, as Minister for Energy, have not shied from—is to do their very, very best to ensure that the people of South Australia have reliable and affordable electricity over the summer period, in particular, but also going forward into the future, while at the same time encouraging the Prime Minister and the other states, the nation as a whole, to ensure that the regulatory system is changed to make it more responsive, agile and flexible.

The government is doing both those things; it is doing the right thing. You can ruminate on issues like the closure of the Northern power station and so on and so forth, but hindsight is a wonderful thing. What I am sad about is that there has been no alternative vision and no alternative plan from those opposite. That is not the way I liked to operate when I was the leader of the opposition. My view is that rather than criticise everybody else's plan it is a good idea to have one of your own. There is none.

I think the plan the government has developed is the right one for the circumstances. Facing very difficult circumstances, the government has taken action, and it is the right action. I am hopeful it will deliver the required results while, as a nation, we sort out this mess.

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (12:07): I also rise to make a contribution to this debate. It is interesting that on potentially the last day of sitting we see many members trying to rewrite history in relation to this topic.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Investment and Trade and the Treasurer are called to order.

Mr KNOLL: Our electricity system was privatised; I think all of South Australia is aware of and can understand that fact. What the government attempts to do in rewriting history is to somehow tie the problem we have today to that issue. I understand; privatisations are not a popular thing and there was a context in which that was undertaken, and the government seems to be trying to tie these two issues together—but they simply do not go together.

If privatisation was an issue why is it that the government responded only earlier this year to issues with our electricity system? It was privatised in 1999. Why is it that it took 17 or 18 years before the government decided to act, re this disgusting privatisation? We have been here for 16 years, and it took the government this long to put two and two together in its own mind.

The reason the government has not acted before now is that it was not a problem before now. We used to have amongst the lowest electricity prices in the country. It has been borne out over a long period of time—

Ms Cook interjecting:

The SPEAKER: I call the member for Fisher to order.

Mr KNOLL: —that we have had a decent and working electricity system. It is only in recent years that we have had issues. You have to ask yourself: is it something that happened back in 1999 that is causing these issues, or is it the changes to our electricity market over the last few years in South Australia? Why is it that South Australia is having these issues more so than other jurisdictions in the rest of the country? Why are we the first ones to have this problem?

The answer is: because we were the ones that went headlong into intermittent energy sources more than anywhere else in the country. The Premier stands up and spruiks that we are a national leader in wind farm generation. You cannot have it both ways. You cannot say that we are out there on the fringe on renewable energy sources and then somehow say, 'No, that's not the cause.' Hang on, it is exactly the cause.

The reason we know it is the cause is that the government's own advice told them. In 2003, a parliamentary select committee, which the member for West Torrens sat on, heard evidence from Lew Owens, who said that you can have a small level of renewable intermittent energy generation in your market. You can have a few hundred megawatts. You can potentially have a little bit more. He belled the cat in 2003 when renewable technologies were first coming onto the market that there is a limit to how much we can have in this current climate. What did the government do? They ignored that warning. In 2009 the government commissioned two independent reports to answer the question about whether or not they were going too far with renewable energy. What did they do? They ignored the advice of those reports.

There are only so many times that a government can be told that it is going the wrong way and for it to ignore that advice before something goes wrong. Now we are in the situation where last year we had 53 per cent of our electricity generated by intermittent sources—53 per cent. That is far beyond any advice given to the government at any point in time over the past 16 years.

The member for Waite has had some sort of brilliant and marvellous epiphany that somehow he has changed his mind on all the issues. I want to know where the member for Waite has been for the past 16 years or since 1997. Why is it only now that he has decided to open his eyes? The reason is that he has been paid off—ministerial office, ministerial salaries.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Point of order.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: We have a point of order. Member for Schubert, sit down; we have a point of order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Point of order: the member should withdraw that imputation that the member has been paid off. That is appalling.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: It has been confirmed; it is appalling. Withdraw and apologise. It is unparliamentary.

Mr Knoll: Doesn't the member have to be here to ask for the apology?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I think if it is unparliamentary—

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! Unfortunately for everybody here, I am actually the one who is ruling on this. I appreciate everyone having an opinion on it. If it is unparliamentary, member for Schubert, it is unparliamentary and that is all there is to it.

Mr KNOLL: I withdraw and apologise.

An honourable member interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, whoever opened their mouth! I presume it is you because you have gone red, member for Stuart.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No dobbing. Order! Everyone needs to understand that it is still a working day.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order on my right! Member for Schubert.

Mr KNOLL: The member for Waite has stated just now that he wants to see more renewables onto our already fragile system. He then goes on to talk about battery storage and solutions to help balance out the intermittency of renewable sources. He talks about a battery that has only been turned on in the last couple of weeks, in fact this week. Where was the government when we were talking about this as a solution when the problems first started? Where were they? Nowhere, against all their independent advice.

The government cannot argue that we have anything other than the highest electricity prices going around. The Treasurer from time to time tries to selectively quote figures that suit his agenda by trying to say there is nothing to see here, everything is okay.

But he said in Hansard in February this year, 'The best forecast we have, of course, is from the ASX forward prices,' which at the time gave him the cover that he has tried to get. The ASX forward prices, the summer contract prices for the NEM, as of yesterday, showed that, for the March quarter in 2018, South Australia has the highest prices in the country: $173.25, compared with $145 in Victoria, $99 in Queensland and $108 in New South Wales. They are the facts, the facts that the Treasurer in February told us we are to believe, but he still says, 'Oh, it's not true.'

We will go to this next election with energy being the central key policy, the key election issue. South Australians will be waiting to make a judgement on a 16-year government who ignored all the warnings they were given, who did not act when the issues—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

Mr KNOLL: —first arose. It was only when it became a political imperative that members opposite chose to act, and that is too late. Instead of helping us manage our transition, instead of helping to keep Alinta open so that we can transition to these new technologies as they come on board, instead of halting the renewal of intermittent energy at a level that is much more stable, that Lew Owens told you back in 2003 that we should have, we are spending half a billion dollars to fix your mistake. The people of South Australia have had enough. They are waiting with baseball bats. Come March next year, they will pass judgement on a government—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Baseball bats for you, yes, orange ones—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!

Mr KNOLL: —that has refused to open its eyes and see the problems that have existed over the past couple of years in our electricity system and stopped them from happening in the first place. Instead of cheap prevention, we have expensive cure, and that is 500 million bucks that we cannot spend on other things like educating our kids or keeping people safe or helping to reduce taxation—half a billion dollars that the government has to spend to fix its own mistakes. It is an absolute disgrace.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet. Stop the clock. Now—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: On my feet! Over here, I am sure I will have to speak to your mother about how to—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order, the Treasurer! I will have to call him to order. He has already been called to order, which means I would have to warn him for the first time, which would mean his last question time this year would be very, very quiet, wouldn't it?

Mr Duluk: His last question time on that side for a long time.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, for this year, I said. Do not put words in my mouth. If everyone has had a deep breath, member for Schubert.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I have to warn you for the first time. I am sorry, that was just flagrant, so you are on your first warning already and we have not even started. Member for Schubert.

Mr KNOLL: The central myth that the government is trying to perpetrate is that somehow privatisation is the problem. All South Australians should know that it is a myth because between 2002 and 2017 the government did nothing about it—nothing. If it was a problem, they had 15 years to act, and did not, and now they are trying to conflate issues for their own political advantage. Well, South Australians are not that stupid. Next year, they will make judgement on the half a billion dollar debacle that this government has put them through, and we will get to turn around and fix our electricity system with a plan that will help to increase competition in the marketplace, to increase flexibility in our energy marketplace and return to a more simple and normal state of operation in our electricity market in South Australia.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN (Lee—Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for Housing and Urban Development) (12:18): It gives me great pleasure to rise and speak against this motion. As the Premier foreshadowed earlier, of course it does bell the cat on what the Liberal Party strategy is with this issue going forward, and it is the immediate, unfettered, instantaneous privatisation of any assets that the state might own in order to make sure that South Australians have access to reliable, secure and affordable energy. They cannot help themselves—they absolutely cannot themselves—and it is endemic in the approach that the Liberal Party takes: whenever there is a powerful vested interest that needs to be supplicated towards, the Liberal Party is there with bells on. We have seen it time—

Ms Chapman: Point of order.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —and time—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! There is a point of order on my left.

Ms CHAPMAN: I am just hoping that somebody in this debate will get back—

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: This is not the time for a speech. You have had a crack. Make a point of order.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! I am on my feet. I know the minister is aware of standing orders. I can only think he is very eager to make his points, but they have to be made according to the standing orders, which means that if someone has a point of order I need to hear it.

Ms CHAPMAN: My point of order is obviously the relevance to this debate. I am just reminding the house that this relates to the provision of evidence being disclosed from the Public Works Committee. I accept that there is broad debate about a number of aspects, but we have had all these speeches about what the Liberal Party does or has not done and nobody is addressing the important substance of this motion.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: We are going to listen very carefully to the remainder of the debate. I am sorry, but I have not been in the chamber all morning for this debate, which just proves I should never leave the chair. We would like to get back to the point of the debate, if we possibly could.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Before I recommence my remarks and the clock starts again, I would like to raise a point of order—

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: As long as it is not frivolous. Here is the Speaker. He will be able to rule on it.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —and that is about standing order 137: an obstruction of the business of the house. We are nearly an hour into this debate and all of a sudden the deputy leader decides that, during debate, she does not like to hear debate. It is outrageous.

The SPEAKER: Mon dieu, a frivolous point of order.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. We will miss you greatly. As I was saying, any time there is a powerful vested interest, there to provide supplication is the Liberal Party, and that was the case back in the 1990s when it came to the sale of the electricity assets that this state owned. Not only are they still shamefaced and humiliated about the devastating mistake they made for the future of this state but inexplicably they are seeking to repeat the same activity again.

Now that the government is investing in assets to make sure that South Australians have access to reliable, secure and affordable electricity, the first thing the deputy leader could say to the media is that she was open-minded to selling them. It is absolutely extraordinary, and that is the context for the debate. Now they are seeking, through this motion, to undermine the ownership by the state of electricity assets. It is an extraordinary approach, but unfortunately for the Liberal Party, it is not unprecedented when it comes to this issue.

Never mind the revisionism that we hear from those opposite who have already contributed to this debate, trying to say that there was some context that forced their hand into the sale of ETSA. If that was really true, why is it that we see each year in every budget paper—Budget Paper 3, table B10—those numbers that show the four budget deficits which the then treasurer, Rob Lucas of the other place, ran? While he was busy going through the process of selling ETSA assets for $3.4 billion, there he is with a government credit card racking up another $1.1 billion dollars worth of debt. Not only was he racking up that debt, he was racking up that debt spending $70 million on consultants during the sale process. No wonder this profligacy required them to sell these assets.

For the member for Schubert to then say, 'Oh, there was no impact over the last 15 years. It has all just happened in the last six months,' really? I can remember the first price increase: January 2003 of 23 per cent—the immediate impacts of the Liberal Party's privatisation of ETSA. This is what South Australian families have had to put up with. This is what happens when you hand to the private sector a revenue-generating machine that can run unfettered against the interests of electricity consumers in this state, year after year after year—massive price increases and massive surplus revenues generated through these assets by people based over in Hong Kong, and South Australians remember.

The Advertiser ran a poll only a few weeks ago. Well over 50 per cent of people recognised that this fault lies at the feet of the Liberal Party and the privatisation of these assets. But inexplicably, the Liberal Party again decides that they will continue selling assets, and that they will continue to do whatever they can to line the pockets of vested corporate interests. We have seen it in the last couple of sitting weeks with the issue of the banking levy. Never mind the egregious rates of credit that South Australians are having to pay on credit cards, on home loans and on businesses—

The SPEAKER: Point of order.

Ms CHAPMAN: Again, relevance: we are now onto the bank tax. We are on about the evidence being published from the Public Works Committee in respect of a piece of equipment? It has nothing to do with the bank tax.

The SPEAKER: I uphold the point of order.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: I will move on. Then of course there is the retail industry, making sure that we can deregulate trading hours to favour Coles and Woolies against the tens of thousands of South Australian businesses.

Ms CHAPMAN: Point of order: how can the—

The Hon. A. Piccolo interjecting:

Ms CHAPMAN: How can the deregulation—

The Hon. A. Piccolo interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Light is called to order for interjecting, and not only interjecting but interjecting while he is on his feet in the gangway.

Ms CHAPMAN: Not in his place.

The Hon. A. Piccolo: I'm not interjecting if I'm not in my seat.

Ms CHAPMAN: I would ask you, sir, to bring the minister back to the substance of the debate in respect of the publication of the evidence from the Public Works Committee in respect of this piece of equipment.

The Hon. A. Piccolo interjecting:

The SPEAKER: I cannot recognise you with that moustache. As the Hon. J.M.A. Lensink would know, I uphold 95 per cent of opportunity points of order, and I uphold this one.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I will join my comments back up. I feel for those electricity consumers who rely on training. Those people like the IGAs, the Foodlands, the corner delis, the local takeaway shops—not only copping it the neck as a result of the ETSA privatisation in the late 1990s but the future policies—

Ms Chapman: Oh, come on.

The SPEAKER: Let's see where it goes.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: —that are now being proposed by the Liberal Party. Now the Liberal Party is back onto it.

Ms CHAPMAN: Point of order: this is debate about the Liberal Party. I make the point of order.

The SPEAKER: Let us see—

The Hon. J.M. Rankine interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Wright is warned. Just let us see if the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure can link up his remarks to the motion.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. And now the Liberal Party is back at it, undermining the process of South Australia investing in our own electricity assets to provide that secure, affordable electricity. They cannot stand the fact that South Australia might own its own assets, and that the people of South Australia might have some direct role and control over the supply of their electricity, how reliable it is and how affordable it is.

It is complete anathema to them because they think the market is just to be trusted holus-bolus with anything, particularly this electricity network. Their policy, flimsy as it is, is to finally roll out an extension cord to New South Wales and hope that that state will supply our electricity from their power. We have seen the risk of them being browned out only in the recent months. Do we honestly think that the Liberal Party plan will see people in New South Wales say, 'I don't feel like consuming today. We'll send all our power over the border because South Australia seems to be having some problems'?

The extraordinary lack of insight and understanding from the Liberal Party of the problem that we are in, and the fact that they caused it, is absolutely galling. The member for Schubert, again rewriting history, says, 'We all know what the problem is: it is the investment in renewable generation.' Every single person in this country, apart from the federal Liberal caucus room, understands that the future of power generation in this country is renewable generation. Everyone does. So, in campaigning against renewable electricity, the member for Schubert finds himself speaking in support of a motion—

Ms CHAPMAN: Point of order: how on earth can a diesel generator and the evidence about that have anything to do with renewable energy? For goodness sake, how far do we have to go with this? Bring him back to the topic.

The SPEAKER: The point of order was expressed most infelicitously and I do not uphold it. Minister.

The Hon. S.C. MULLIGHAN: Thank you, Mr Speaker. In the comments that the member for Schubert made about intermittent generation and campaigning against it, he finds himself supporting a motion undermining dispatchable generation. That is the remarkable position that those members opposite find themselves in. For them, this is not about how to better manage the grid or about South Australian ownership of these assets. They want to do everything they possibly can to ensure that South Australians do not have access, control or influence over South Australian generation. They are merely seeking to oppose the government and seeking to maximise the number of opportunities they have to privatise assets in this state for the benefit of corporate interests.

What is it about the Liberal Party that they do not believe in South Australians' capacity to look after themselves? They do not believe in our capacity to make sure that we have an electricity generation network that is secure, reliable and affordable. They do not trust us to do that. They would only trust somebody based over in Hong Kong. They do not trust Holden workers to build cars, they do not trust people at Techport to build submarines and they do not trust doctors and nurses in our hospitals or teachers in our schools. That is why they will not campaign to get our fair share of funding. They cannot stand South Australia and yet, inexplicably, they ask to govern it. They do not deserve to be here at all, let alone govern this state.

Mr DULUK: Point of order: that is just rubbish. We all love South Australia—

The SPEAKER: No, it is not a point of order to say to the Speaker, 'Point of order: this is rubbish.' Could you come up with something a little more substantive?

Mr DULUK: It is definitely debate.

The SPEAKER: Debate.

The Hon. J.M. Rankine: It is a debate.

The SPEAKER: It is a debate; it is not question time. I cannot uphold the point of order. The member for MacKillop.

Mr WILLIAMS (MacKillop) (12:32): I rise to support the motion brought by the deputy leader that evidence regarding the state government's procurement of diesel generators that was heard in camera by the Public Works Committee on 10 August 2017 be made public.

It is very important that the public is aware of what is going on. Let me go back a moment to the previous speaker. The minister would have us believe something that is obviously not based in fact. The minister would have us forget that there was ever a man called Hilmer who called for competition, particularly amongst government-owned assets, and particularly within electricity generation and distribution across this—

Members interjecting:

Mr WILLIAMS: We will not go into Marcus Clark. We all know that.

The SPEAKER: The member for Stuart is called to order and the Treasurer is warned for the second and the final time.

Mr WILLIAMS: If anybody in South Australia honestly believes that privatisation caused the current dilemma, then their belief is founded on ignorance. Our current problems have been caused by the undermining of economically efficient generation in South Australia and by the plethora of investment in renewables, which only run for part of the time, only supply for part of the demand period and even then are unreliable. The reality is this government plans to spend $500 million—a bit more I think—of taxpayers' money to paper over its own failings.

The Minister for Energy revealed to this house earlier this year, I think it was in March, that some $7 billion has been spent on renewable generators in this state in recent years. That is $7 billion on renewables, and we now have to go out and spend another $5½ million of taxpayers' money because that $7 billion worth of generation capacity does not work; it does not provide for our needs. How much money does this government believe needs to be expended in South Australia before renewables can provide for our needs?

The reality is that if we spent another $7 billion we would still have blackouts. We would still not be able to provide electricity 24/7 if that $7 billion was to be spent on renewables. Rooftop solar panels and wind farms do not run 24/7. We do not have the capacity to store electricity. The technology to store electricity at the grid scale is just not available. In saying that, I mean it is not available in an economic sense.

We could build a battery. If we pooled all the resources of the state and the nation, we might build a battery that could store 20 or 30 per cent of our needs. The reality is that if the battery of this government (the biggest lithium ion battery in the world we are told) was the only supply available, on the average usage in South Australia, which is about 1,200 megawatt hours, it would provide supply for about six minutes.

We have been told so much nonsense by a government that has made so many mistakes in this area. I recall being the opposition spokesperson when the first feed-in tariff scheme went through as a piece of legislation in this parliament—

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Presumably, the minister would like to be here to reply?

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: Yes.

The SPEAKER: Good, splendid.

Mr WILLIAMS: —when I supported Mark Parnell in the other place, who increased the length of the feed-in scheme from five to 25 years. I think it was minister Conlon who was promoting that piece of legislation, which the government was adamant to get through so that the then premier, who was making a keynote speech at the February 2008 solar cities conference here in Adelaide, could claim to have the first piece of feed-in tariff legislation in the nation—and he got it. He got it because he acquiesced to the Liberal Party's and Mark Parnell's demand, that if you were going to have a feed-in tariff it had to be meaningful.

I remember saying to the house at the time, and it is in Hansard, that we as a parliament will have to revisit this regularly. The government told the parliament at the time that once we got to a point of 10 megawatts of installed capacity, we would have a review of the scheme. We passed 60 megawatts of installed capacity of rooftop solar, and the review still had not started, notwithstanding the member for Light at the time telling the parliament that the review had started. I think that was in September 2009.The review was not announced and did not start until the end of October of that year.

By the time the review was concluded, we had gone through the next election cycle, and it was some six months later. What did the premier then do? He wanted to increase the feed-in tariff from 40¢ to 64¢ a kilowatt hour. When I argued this outside the chamber with the then minister, Michael O'Brien, he said, 'I know, Mitch, but you are going to stop us. We are not going to withdraw it. We know it is a nonsense, but you are going to stop us.' That is what happened.

This government has been absolutely derelict in its handling of the electricity supply in this state, telling the people of South Australia a few years ago that by deregulating electricity prices those prices would come down.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: You said we didn't do it fast enough.

Mr WILLIAMS: I think you did it, minister—by deregulating, the prices would come down. You got that one wrong, too, just as you are getting this one wrong. You could spend another $7 billion on renewables and every time the wind stopped blowing the lights would go out, and you know it. You could spend another $7 billion on rooftop solar panels and every time the sun goes down the lights will go out, and you know it.

The sad reality is that anybody who understands anything about the production and distribution of electricity knows that you need 24/7 production. Even this government now accepts that because it is going to waste—sorry, that is the wrong language; it is going to use—another $5½ million of taxpayers' money putting in some consistent generation.

Mr van Holst Pellekaan: 550.

Mr WILLIAMS: $550 million putting in some fossil fuel-driven generation. All of a sudden, that is the big, 'Wow, we got it wrong,' from the government. That is the admission that you cannot run an electricity grid on renewables. That is the admission. The unfortunate thing is that, yet again, the taxpayers will have to foot the bill. If this government had any common sense whatsoever it would not have allowed the Northern power station to close. If this government had been half sensible it would have planned a transition, and that transition will occur.

I agree that we will move to renewables, but it is going to take time and it is not going to happen in two or three years. It might be 20 years or it might be 50 years. Nobody knows because we do not know exactly the technology that we are going to turn to. In the meantime, those zealots who are driving us into this world of renewables without any storage are causing the lights to go out, they are causing the prices to go up and they are causing us to spend more of the taxpayers' money.

For God's sake, let the taxpayers understand what is going on by freeing up a little bit of the information. Every time the government hides information from the public I become more and more cynical. Unfortunately, I will be leaving this place as a very cynical man.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Treasurer, Minister for Finance, Minister for State Development, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy) (12:42): Didn't that sound all very reasonable, other than that none of it is factual. This is one of the members opposite who sat here as an Independent when the privatisation of ETSA occurred and made arguments to the parliament that the reason he was supporting the sale was not about maintaining base load generation, was not about integrating renewable energy but was about de-risking the state. That was his argument.

His argument was that, by owning an electricity asset, it exposed the taxpayer to risk and cost. He talked about ideology causing the problems of intermittent renewable energy impacting on base load generation, but his fiscally conservative ideology of hating public ownership of essential utilities and handing it over to the private sector is different.

Ms Chapman: Like the LTO.

The SPEAKER: The deputy leader is called to order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: So here we are comparing electricity to the processing of titles.

The Hon. C.J. Picton: That is what you just did.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That is what she just did.

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Police is called to order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: So the fridge is not on but I can process my title once in every 20 years. The interesting thing about this motion is that it calls for more transparency through the Public Works Committee by making evidence that was received in camera public, but the deputy leader does not mention that there were two members of the opposition in that in-camera inquiry who heard that evidence and agreed to it being in camera. However, now for publicity and now as a stunt, to subvert the parliamentary process and the committee process, she moves this motion. The honourable member for Unley—who was the other member?

The Hon. P. Caica: I don't know who it was; they have had that much turnover. It could be Peter Treloar.

The SPEAKER: He is not 'the honourable'. He is the member for Unley.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That is true. He has never held executive office. As part of the energy plan announced in March 2017, the South Australian government committed to building a brand-new gas-fired generator. We committed to it, we said it publicly, we announced that we would. In the interim, we planned to design and construct, with South Australia's distribution company, SA Power Networks, temporary generation to help AEMO get us through the next two summers.

Two separate procurement processes were undertaken for the temporary generation at the power plant. During the procurement process, it was identified that the best option was to purchase the TM2500 turbines from APR Energy, to be relocated to a permanent site, to present an opportunity to achieve better value for money whilst using similar technology as proposed by a number of permanent-solution bidders. That is, we announced that we were going out to tender for temporary diesel generators and we were going to have a permanent gas-fired solution.

What we got out of the tender was both through one procurement; that is, we had generators that could operate on two fuels. They could operate temporarily as diesel generators and be moved to a central site later to be operated as a permanent solution on gas. During this process, the South Australian government, with SAPN, issued an RFI to 15 potential suppliers of temporary generation. Three were short-listed for further technical and commercial negotiations. There was an evaluation team comprised of the head of SAPN's procurement and a team including consultants from KPMG and engineers experienced in generator installation and electrical infrastructure connection requirements.

The government worked with SAPN to understand the market capabilities, identify an optimal approach and balance cost, timing and capacity to deliver in accordance with the requirements of AEMO, ESCOSA, the EPA and the Development Act. Importantly, the work was overseen by the chief procurement officer, the executive director of energy plan implementation and other members of the energy plan implementation task force. APR represented the lowest cost necessary for the commencement date, had the highest compliance with AEMO connection requirements and EPA licence requirements and also achieved the highest rating of all the suppliers evaluated.

Following the recommendation by SAPN to government, contracts were negotiated between the government, SAPN and APR with the support of the Crown Solicitor's Office and external technical and commercial advisers, Aurecon and PwC respectively. Concurrently with the temporary generator process, procurement was undertaken for the 250-megawatt permanent generator. Following the assessment of an open expression of interest process advertised on the South Australian tenders and contracts website that received 31 proposals, the DPC Accredited Purchasing Unit (APU) approved the short list of several responses received to the invitation to supply in an RTF process.

In accordance with that plan, the evaluation team assessed the response, aided by report specialists from JWS legal, Aurecon technical and PwC commercial. During the procurement process, the energy implementation team identified the option to purchase the TM2500 turbines from APR Energy, to be relocated to a permanent site. What this argument gets down to is that we have a window of time when we can purchase these generators. That window opened earlier this month and closes at a later date. The opposition's argument is that we should exercise this option at the end, not at the beginning.

Given our procurement, given the processes we went through, we were satisfied that there was no benefit in waiting. In fact, it could have caused a delay because, if we had been spending money on developing the permanent site, engaging consultants and having public consultation on where to locate these generators, the opposition would be saying to us today, 'Why are you spending public money on the allocation of funds to put some temporary generation on a permanent site, sign gas contracts, clear the site, achieve the approvals and get the development approvals when you don't even own the assets yet?' They would be criticising us for doing this work for assets we do not own yet because we have not exercised the option. Of course, whatever we did they would have complained. If we had not exercised the option and were spending this money they would say it was a waste, but because we exercised the option they are saying it is a waste.

What this is really about is that the opposition bungled its energy plan by the hapless shadow minister saying publicly that they will not need to exercise the option of purchasing the generators, they are going to have a reverse auction to get that reserve trader option into the state. So he thinks that in two years' time these generators will be packed up and off they go, and that someone else in the private sector, in six months' time, is going to build new generation to meet his reverse auction.

What they are really doing is within that $550 million envelope they are trying to take those savings out to spend them on other matters because they cannot balance the books for the extra commitments they want to make. What they are really doing is they want to privatise these assets to spend them on something else, and then claim they can get the same outcome through a reverse auction.

Of course we know—because the shadow minister bungled the announcement, he made it quite clear—that the savings from the energy plan through the reverse auction, through their interconnector to New South Wales, will save South Australians only $60 to $70 in five to six years. So we have to vote for them twice, two elections, to get savings of $60 to $70. I want to thank the shadow minister for pointing that out, because it is off to the advertising agency as we speak.

We have seen a few rushes of the ads on Twitter and on Facebook, but I can tell the honourable member that he is going to be famous. Every 30 minutes for 30 seconds we will have the shadow energy minister rolling his eyes, looking confused and dazed, and talking about how there is only $70 worth of savings in five to six years. Thank you very much, I could not have done it better myself. I was really worried about how we deconstruct this, but I did not realise we had an asset and a friend in the shadow minister, and I want to thank him for it.

Now we are being told that even though they were in the Public Works Committee—they heard the evidence in camera, they know what it is, they agreed to get the evidence in camera—for a stunt they want to make it public. Well, the parliament should see this for what it is: a confused and scared opposition fighting on two fronts. They are fighting in their backyard, because members are creating all these open seats for the Xenophon group to quite nicely come in and take them on.

The shadow minister has taken the one ship they thought they had to carry them into office and he has bungled it. Everyone knows that, and that is why it is the shadow attorney general and not the shadow energy minister who is leading this. They do not trust him because he stuffed it up.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (12:52): What absolute and complete rubbish. Let me be very clear: the Minister for Energy clearly does not have the stomach to hear what I am about to say. I do not doubt for a second that he believes what he said, I am sure he practices it before the mirror several times a day. I am sure he believes that rubbish, but let me tell you it is complete rubbish.

What is so unfortunate about this debate is that the opposition is trying to do the very best it can for South Australia. The opposition wants to get information that the government wants to keep secret, and we want to make it available for South Australians and everybody who has an interest in this issue. All the government has wanted to do for the last nearly an hour and a half is waste the parliament's time debating the merits of two different energy policies.

The government spent $2.6 million of taxpayers' money advertising their energy policy, so there is no need for them to do that. They are trying to sneak away from the issue of secrecy and just hope that everybody gets mixed up in the argument about the pros and cons of energy policy. Well, I will not do that. The deputy leader has brought forward a very clear, straightforward motion that says, 'Let's make the information public, the information about how much of taxpayers' money the government plans to spend to fix the mess they created in the energy department.'

The state government spends $27 million per year on its own energy policy department, and it got us into this mess. It is absolutely disgraceful that they would do that. The current Minister for Energy has been in charge of energy for over six years, he is responsible for the mess we are in, but all he does is laugh and bluster and carry on and apparently swear to his departmental staff in the background, according to an ICAC report. He has no respect from people who—

The SPEAKER: Is this relevant to the question of whether evidence is going to be released, or is it just an ad hominem attack?

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: It is relevant to the debate about this motion and the previous speaker's comments, sir.

The SPEAKER: I hope you will view with equal equanimity an ad hominem attack on a member of the opposition from a government speaker.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: Thank you, Speaker, for that advice. The reality is that this is not about the merits of the energy policy. We can do that anytime, anywhere. This is about the government being secret. This is about the government wanting to spend more than $400 million of taxpayers' money to purchase generators that the government says they do not plan to use. The minister made the fatal error of telling the public that he does not expect to use these generators and, if they are used, they will be used very rarely. It was a fatal error by the Minister for Energy.

Now, to cover up for that mistake, he has to cover up the amount of money he is spending on these generators because he is terrified that South Australians will find out how much of their money he is spending on these generators. It is absolutely disgraceful. His excuse for doing it is, 'Oh, if we divulge the information, that could disadvantage the company we bought them from in their negotiations with other states.'

He does not work for other states, he does not work for the company that is selling the generators: he works for South Australia. Why does he want to keep information secret from South Australians so that the company he bought the generators from can do a better deal with other customers? What on earth has that got to do with his ministerial responsibilities? Nothing. He is going to keep this information secret from South Australians and make sure that none of them knows how much of their money he is spending.

Let me just take it back to the beginning. Of course we need to transition away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy, but it must be done in a well-planned, well-managed way that does not place too great a price, a cost, a punishment upon South Australians along the way, the way the government's policy has done. The government says that it is okay for the prices to go up, it is okay for the reliability to decline, because the government thinks it is in the best interests of South Australians in the long run to get away from fossil fuels and towards renewable energy.

But here is the hypocrisy of the whole thing: the government says it is moving away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy. The opposition says, 'Yes, renewable energy, fantastic, but in a well-planned, well-managed way.' The government says, 'No, no, it's okay, we are rushing towards it and that's fine.' Then they hit a brick wall and say, 'The solution to the problem is more fossil fuels.' The government's own policy to move away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy has to be rescued by another gas generator. It is absolutely ridiculous logic.

Having been caught out in that ridiculous process of moving from fossil fuels to renewable energy and back to fossil fuels, and having been caught out by making it very clear that the Minister for Energy puts the interests of the company he is buying the generators from—their commercial interest and the interest of other customers who might buy generators from that company—ahead of South Australians, he now needs to try to keep this information secret.

The deputy leader is 100 per cent correct: this information should be made public. This information should be available for everyone to see. Do you know why? Because the people of South Australia do not trust the Treasurer. I challenge every single member of this house. We are all thinking of polls, we are all reminded of polls, we are all getting polling results everywhere. I challenge the government to release polling information they have about the personal rating, particularly when it comes to trust, of the Minister for Energy. Let me be wrong. If that information exists that says that the people of South Australia trust him, please bring it forward.

That is why the deputy leader has moved this motion. That is why we want this information. Because when the Minister for Energy says that the entire budget for the government's plan to fix the mess that it created is within the $550 million, which it announced back on 13 March, we do not believe them and the public do not believe them. We want the information to be made public. The Liberal Party has a positive solution to the energy crisis in South Australia, which has been independently assessed. The government refuses to provide any independent assessment. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 13:00 to 14:02.