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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-05-30 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

Power Prices

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (15:34): South Australia has recorded the highest power bill prices in the nation under the watch of the Minister for Energy. If you think you are experiencing a nightmare case of deja vu, you would be correct, because when he was last the Minister for Energy in the Weatherill Labor government not only did he preside over the statewide blackout but he also gave South Australian households the highest electricity prices in the nation.

The former Liberal government introduced successful power policies, including the largest rollout of home batteries per capita across the world, that reversed Labor's legacy of sky-high power prices. Between June 2018 and December 2021, ESCOSA reported that the average household power bill reduced by $421. Not having learnt their lesson, though, this current government had no plan coming into the 2022 election to ensure electricity supply was both affordable and reliable, and over a year later the government still do not have a plan. The Minister for Energy is back in charge and South Australian families and households are paying for it.

Last week, the Australian Energy Regulator released their default market offer, which showed the average South Australian household power bill increased by nearly 24 per cent and will do so from 1 July. This translates into up to an additional $512 for South Australian households. This massive increase in household power bills is crippling just as we come into winter. It adds to the other costs, such as interest rate rises and cost-of-living rises, that we are facing in South Australia with a cost-of-living crisis. South Australia's inflation rate is at 7.9 per cent, the highest in the nation, and the opposition has found that the average South Australian household is $17,000 worse off under this Malinauskas Labor government. This power bill shock is only going to make things worse.

Households in South Australia are not the only ones feeling the pain; it is also small businesses. They are staring down a 29 per cent increase, or $1,310, to their electricity bill. The cost of doing business in South Australia is already going up and these skyrocketing power bills are just going to make it worse. Of course, there is only so much a small business can do, and turning off the power is not an option. We do not want to see businesses having to make the choice between paying a power bill or employing staff, especially as South Australia already has the highest unemployment rate in the nation.

South Australia had the highest power price increase in the nation for households without controlled loads and also small businesses. The Premier and the Minster for Energy knew that these increases were coming. When the draft default market offer came in March, the estimated power bill increases for both households and small businesses were already a cause for alarm, but last week's power price increases were even more than first anticipated two months ago. In that time, both the Premier and the Minister for Energy have been flying around Europe talking about hydrogen instead of spending time fixing South Australians' power bills.

Shockingly, last week in parliament it was revealed that the government's $600 million experimental hydrogen power station will not deliver cheaper electricity bills for struggling South Australian households. Since last year, when power bills started rising, the opposition has called for the state government to provide energy bill relief such as other states have done. Unfortunately, it has taken until the last couple of weeks for the government to announce how they will participate in the commonwealth bill rebates. Of course, this is only for eligible concession holders.

We know that rebates are unsustainable in the long term, but in the absence of any sort of plan by this government there still needs to be help. At the same time, the Malinauskas government is running cover for the federal Labor government's election commitment to reduce people's power bills by $275; meanwhile, South Australian businesses and families are left to deal with these massive price increases. Middle income households not eligible for the commonwealth's bill relief will be left to fend for themselves. Skyrocketing energy prices under the Malinauskas Labor government are yet again a clear sign that we have returned to the bad old days of Labor, when we experienced the highest power prices in the nation.

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