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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2016-02-10 Daily Xml
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Electricity Prices

Mr MARSHALL (Dunstan—Leader of the Opposition) (15:27): Given that the Treasurer has outlined to the house that he has read the AER report, can he outline to the house how much higher South Australia's future electricity prices are relative to other states in Australia going forward?

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS (West Torrens—Treasurer, Minister for Finance, Minister for State Development, Minister for Mineral Resources and Energy) (15:27): Given that again he hasn't outlined whether it is wholesale or retail prices he is talking about, probably because he doesn't understand the difference—

Mr Marshall interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Is that the next question? Is that the next question on your list? As I was saying, we want efficient and competitive bidding. We want to get that wholesale price down. The AER is predicting prices of $90 per megawatt hour. That is unacceptable; we cannot allow that to occur in South Australia and we are working hard to do that. But, as I said, it is very hard when the opposition are the ones who broke up these assets. Given we don't control it like they do in New South Wales and like they do in Queensland, where the government runs these assets and is able to offer community service obligations, and it owns transmission, and it owns the poles and wires, and it owns the generators, and it is able to make decisions in the interests of consumers, instead we are at the mercy of the market.

Now, the AEMC made its final rule determination on 10 December 2015 which will amend the relevant provisions in the National Electricity Rules as follows. The current requirement that offers be made in good faith will be replaced by a prohibition against making false or misleading offers. Any variation to offers—

Mr Marshall interjecting:

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: You are so predictable, I knew what you were going to ask. It is not as if you are hard to read. Mr Speaker—I've read some cheap books but you are a 25¢ book. I know the ending, I know how this ends.

The SPEAKER: Member for Schubert.

Mr KNOLL: Mr Speaker, I think you are worth well more than 25¢.

The SPEAKER: I was rather hoping it would be a point of order. Is the minister finished? Minister.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: I will tell you how the story ends after question time. It ends up with you crying in your office, but we will talk about that later. The current requirement that offers be made in good faith will be replaced by a prohibition against making—and this is important, sir—false or misleading offers. Any variation to offers that are bid in good faith will need to be made as soon as practicable. A requirement to preserve a record of the circumstances surrounding late re-bids will also be introduced. So when retail—

Mr Marshall: This is not even pertinent to the question.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: This affects the price. To explain to the Leader of the Opposition how this actually works: the wholesale price influences the retail price; the wholesale price is bid. So I am talking about the bidding process. If the Leader of the Opposition doesn't understand it and is just, through nervous energy, screaming insults because it's not going the way he planned, that's not my fault. He is the most unpopular Liberal in the country. It is not my fault he told everyone to vote Labor.

Ms REDMOND: Point of order: the minister is engaging in debate rather than answering the question.

The SPEAKER: I uphold the point of order.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Through the COAG Energy Council, we are also conferring to the AER a wholesale market monitoring function. That monitoring function is very important. The AER will be required to publish on its website a wholesale market review report not less than every two years. We will be pursuing amendments to the national electricity law to implement this function every two years as a requirement. On 15 December 2015, the government held an energy industry round table, which brought—

Ms Chapman: Big deal!

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: 'Big deal!' The round table brought a representative group of large energy users, retailers, generators, networkers and market bodies to identify and discuss these emerging issues. The opposition are ridiculing that, but they all turned up, because business think this is important.

Mr Gardner: We are ridiculing your inability to understand the question.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: No, you are ridiculing the round table, which is all about how you view consultation, because we are out there talking to the industry about how to fix this.

The SPEAKER: The Treasurer's time has expired. The member for Kaurna.

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