Switch for Solar

Dr HARVEY (Newland) (15:06): My question is to the Minister for Energy and Mining. Can the minister update the house on how the Marshall Liberal government is cutting electricity bills for concession holders and any contrary views?

The Hon. D.C. VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart—Minister for Energy and Mining) (15:06): Thank you very much to the member for Newland for his question. He is somebody who is always working incredibly hard for his constituents in many ways, including reducing the cost of living for them, including the cost of electricity.

We are working incredibly hard and we are achieving good results—not enough, and we have more work to do. We have already, through our work with industry, with supply side, with demand side, with regulatory bodies, etc., achieved a $269 per year reduction in the cost of electricity on average for households. But there is more work to do.

One of the things that we very recently announced is what we are calling Switch for Solar. We are running a pilot program for a thousand homes to, if they choose, voluntarily surrender their cost-of-living and their energy concessions in return for receiving free solar installation on their homes. This is a very positive opportunity. It is a pilot and it is an offer to those households. Nobody is compelled to do that. If they would like to sign up, they are welcome to sign up. We believe that this will be very good for those people.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for West Torrens!

The Hon. D.C. VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN: Our modelling shows us that if they surrender approximately $450 or $460 per year in government taxpayer-funded concessions and they receive the 4.4 kilowatt-hour solar system on their homes they will save in excess of the concessions that they have forgone—between $220 and $465 per year. We are running a trial to make sure that the modelling is proven, and we are pretty optimistic that this will be a very good thing.

In return for voluntarily surrendering a taxpayer-funded energy concession, the household will be given the solar and the reductions per year on their electricity bills will more than offset the energy concession they have forgone. We are working very hard to make sure that everybody, not just those people who can afford the equipment but everybody across society, has the opportunity to benefit from the electricity cost reductions.

The member for West Torrens has publicly said that he completely disagrees with this program. I can't imagine why he thinks this is a bad program, but that's his view.