Power Prices

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA (Hartley—Leader of the Opposition) (14:17): My question is to the Premier. Will the government's hydrogen power plant lower power prices for South Australian households and, if so, by how much and when?

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Minister for Infrastructure and Transport, Minister for Energy and Mining) (14:18): We have been very clear that our entire aim with the generator is threefold: we want the generator to offer competition in the wholesale market, we want to showcase our ability to show that hydrogen can store energy when there are times of oversupply of renewable energy and we want it for some security.

The Premier made a very big point at the last election about politicians promising price decreases in retail pricing. Members opposite made these types of promises to the people of South Australia and couldn't meet it—could not meet it—and the truth is our job is to make sure that we have a competitive market and we want to make sure that the generator is there to provide system security.

The reason we have to provide that system security is that, you might recall, in the term between 2014 and 2018 the state government, in response to a statewide blackout, put in place temporary generation that was there for the state's strategic reserve. For the first time since ETSA, the state government had state strategic reserve of a power—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Members on my left! Member for Unley, you can leave the chamber until the end of question time. It has been six minutes.

The honourable member for Unley having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That state strategic reserve was there to provide the state with the ability to have sovereign capability. When the private sector let us down and couldn't provide the power we needed, we had state reserve there to pump into the system. Once again, on leaving office our opponents returned to form and privatised those assets. When they—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Florey is on his final warning.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: That strategic reserve was then sold to the private sector and put into the market, and the market responded by taking supply out—taking supply out. In the end, we were no better off in terms of strategic supply and, of course, capacity in the system.

What we have seen subsequently is we have seen more power come out of the system, but thankfully this government, which is not anti-renewables, is seeing more wind farms being built, more storage being built and more capacity in the system. More capacity is seeing wholesale prices drop. You are seeing more competition in the market, and because of what is going on globally you are seeing an increase in the cost of gas that is setting the price across the country.

What is causing gas prices to increase? Scarcity of gas. What was the political party in this chamber that banned exploration and production of gas, one of our largest bases? The guilty party opposite—the guilty party opposite. So we won't be lectured about power prices, we won't be lectured about energy security and we won't be lectured about the state owning generation in this state. It is the right thing to do, because we agree with Tom Playford: power belongs in the people's hands, not in the private sector.