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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2024-02-21 Daily Xml
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Motions

Power Prices

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (11:14): I move:

That this house—

(a) notes that South Australian working families and small businesses are enduring some of the highest power prices in the country under the Malinauskas Labor government;

(b) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their inaction resulting in driving sky-high power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis; and

(c) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their costly, experimental hydrogen power plant, that will not reduce power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses, as their only energy policy.

It is always a good opportunity to speak in parliament about this very important matter, but I should note that in the week that we are in we have had a massive announcement relating to the defence posture of the country and what that means for South Australian defence industries.

No doubt you, Mr Speaker, will be aware that later on, in the third motion on the Notice Paper, I also have a motion standing in my name talking about defence. Being so important to the state's economy, I did offer the opportunity for those opposite to swap this motion around with that one, but that was unfortunately declined. So, hopefully, I will keep my comments to somewhat of a brief nature so that we can progress through the proceedings and potentially get to that as well.

In terms of where we are at now in South Australia, in 2023 South Australia has recorded the highest power bill price increases in the nation under the watch of the Minister for Energy and Mining. What that means is that South Australian working families and South Australian small and big businesses are having to endure some of the highest power prices in the country under the Malinauskas Labor government. If you think that you are experiencing a nightmare case of deja vu, you are correct. When he was last the Minister for Energy in the Weatherill Labor government, not only did the minister preside over the statewide blackout in 2016 but he also gave South Australian households the highest electricity prices in the nation.

Under the former Weatherill Labor government, if you cast your mind back, South Australia suffered from high wholesale electricity prices with frequent spikes, supply squeezes, stability and frequency control problems, with household electricity bills rising by over $550 in the last two years. This coincided with over seven million customer hours lost for blackouts due to load shedding. When the former Liberal government came in, they inherited what was an energy system that would be best described as in a shambles.

Setting about its work, the former Liberal government introduced successful power policies that included the largest rollout of home batteries per capita in the world, and this along with other measures helped reverse Labor's legacy of sky-high power prices. In fact, between June 2018 and December 2021, ESCOSA reported that the average household power bill had fallen by $421. That was a decrease of nearly 20 per cent on household electricity bills for people living in the suburbs of Kensington and Firle, as well as many other South Australian suburbs.

Not having learnt their lesson, the current government had no plan at the 2022 election to ensure electricity supply was affordable and reliable. They just thought, 'Well, this just happens and it will just go on.' What has happened, though, is that the Premier put the same person in charge of South Australia's energy system who was in charge previously. That is a system that has a direct impact on the power bills that households and small businesses pay here in South Australia. The Premier did that knowingly, thinking it would all work out. But when they talk about the definition of stupidity, is that not defined as doing the same thing and expecting a different result? I think that applies here, because here we are two years later and the government still does not have a plan. The Minister for Energy is back in charge, and now South Australian families and businesses are paying for it.

These skyrocketing power bills were brought into sharp focus back in July last year when a default market offer for 2023 came into effect. The default market offer for an average household power bill in South Australia in places such as Norwood, Payneham and Marden increased by nearly 24 per cent, which translates to an increase of between $439 up to an additional $512 on South Australian household electricity bills. Of course, the number of South Australian households on the default market offer is around 60,000, and the remainder are on contracts with their electricity provider. However, immediately after this announcement of the default market offer we started seeing customers on contracts being contacted by their electricity retailer, and they found that their new contracts also went up substantially, in most cases in line with the 24 per cent increase found in the default market offer.

These are massive rises in household power bills. They are crippling blows for families that are already suffering under massive cost-of-living surges in other areas as well. As I said previously, the analysis done by the opposition shows that an average South Australian family, with two children and an average mortgage, is nearly $20,000 worse off under the Malinauskas Labor government.

Of course, South Australian households are not the only ones feeling the pain, as small businesses have had even larger increases of nearly 29 per cent or $1,310. This was the biggest rise in the nation. These businesses deserve better because the cost of doing business in South Australia is also going up and these skyrocketing power bills will have a big impact. When you listen to small businesses there is only so much they can cut back on, and certainly turning the power off is not an option for them. We do not want to see businesses having to choose between paying their electricity bill or employing staff, especially when we look at the latest employment statistics that show that almost 20,000 full-time jobs were lost in South Australia between November 2023 and January 2024, so we do not want to see that happening.

Also, last year in August AEMO released a report raising the alarm about the reliability of electricity supply here in South Australia. They indicated that Victoria and South Australia were most at risk of blackouts in the year ahead. So, despite South Australians paying some of the highest power prices in the nation, we also have the lowest grid reliability and are being warned to brace for blackouts.

At the same time, in August, the independent regulator ESCOSA also reported that the average market offer for electricity for a household in South Australia had jumped by $169, rising from $2,041 in June 2022 to $2,210 in June 2023. These power price rises for households, in suburbs such as Joslin and Royston Park, do not even take into account the massive price rises that then kicked off from 1 July when the default market offer came in that saw households having rises of up to $512. These are really big rises here. We all remember federal Labor saying they were going to bring down prices by $275 but, in fact, this is way more but going in the other direction.

Of course, those opposite have tried to deflect blame and not take responsibility, trying to say that it was an east coast problem, but when you look at the July 2023 price increases that occurred under the default market offer, which incorporated South Australia, New South Wales and Queensland electricity users, it was South Australia that had the highest of the price rises of those states. Also, Victoria runs its own standard offer, and the increase in dollar terms in SA compared to Victoria was also higher. It really is not true to say that it is an east coast problem.

As I said previously, this government had no plan at the election to ensure that electricity supply here in SA was both affordable and reliable. We do know that in their first budget they cut successful programs that the former Liberal government had undertaken to bring down prices: the Grid Scale Storage Fund, the home battery subsidy, and Switch for Solar. All these went a great deal towards bringing down prices for South Australians.

By saying that it is an east coast problem here, why then would South Australia have the highest bill prices? It really says that the truth is that it is a South Australian problem here, and the Premier needs to acknowledge this. He needs to get his priorities in order and set about having a plan here in South Australia.

Of course, I have gone to the point where the government does not have a plan. They try to respond by making it seem like they have a plan. Back in November 2022, to try to cover up their lack of a plan they said, 'We're commissioning ESCOSA to inquire into retail energy prices.' Well, we are still waiting for that.

They also established the National Energy Crisis Taskforce. Again, no result. There have been a lot of announcements, but no outcomes. We are still waiting for a plan to ensure that South Australians have an affordable and reliable plan. At the same time, the government is spending over $600 million on an experimental hydrogen power station. Labor has admitted that it is targeted at industrial customers. It is not aimed at delivering cheaper electricity bills for struggling South Australian households in suburbs such as Kent Town, Maylands, Evandale or Stepney.

Just last parliamentary week, I asked the minister himself if this experimental hydrogen power station would reduce South Australian household electricity bills and if so by how much. His response would certainly leave working families in those suburbs I mentioned, who are struggling under skyrocketing power bills, very alarmed. He said:

First and foremost, we have always said this is about trying to get an improvement for industrial users. It's commercial and industrial customers we are targeting.

Going on to this, in May last year, appearing at the Budget and Finance Committee, the Office of Hydrogen Power SA chief executive, Mr Crafter, was asked on 23 separate occasions whether Labor's $600 million hydrogen power plant would lower household electricity bills. On each occasion, all he could respond with was, 'The targeted objective of this power plant is to lower prices for industrial customers.'

As I have outlined previously in parliament, the Premier has completely changed the nature and scope of what was promised to South Australians prior to the election. They have also dropped their promise of the 3,600 tonnes of liquefied hydrogen storage, basically to avoid a massive cost blowout. We know that modelling shows it was going to cost hundreds of millions of dollars, not the $31 million that was first claimed. Again, in the Budget and Finance Committee Mr Crafter confirmed this was the case.

This was one of the four main pillars of their hydrogen plan and they have had to drop it. You have to think what else in this plan should be called into question. How does it affect the modelling and the costings they have now? We know that they have also given up on their promise to provide a combined cycle base load power station. Instead, they are going for a peaking station. Again, that fundamentally changes the project. It changes what implications it will have for industry in South Australia, which those opposite were trying to talk about before.

Now we have a peaking station. Industry does not work just on a peak; it is meant to be 24/7. They are trying to change their scope on a project, those opposite, because they know there is no way the original project could be delivered for their $590 million, especially when we have had massive jumps in construction cost inflation of about 30 per cent in two years. That puts the cost of this $593 million up to about $770 million, and that does not include costs that would be required for transmission lines, that would be required for the water pipelines.

Stunningly, just last year in October the minister confessed on a podcast that 'if the cost changes, it changes. Nothing to see here; that's okay. Just try us, okay. It's only taxpayer money.' While South Australians are living through a cost-of-living crisis, they would be shocked that the Premier is blowing more than $600 million of taxpayer money—or more—on an experimental hydrogen power plant that Labor has admitted will not lower electricity bills for households or small businesses. Those same households and businesses are suffering skyrocketing energy prices under the Malinauskas Labor government, which is yet again a clear sign that we have returned to the very bad old days of Labor when we experienced the highest power prices in the nation.

Ms HOOD (Adelaide) (11:28): I rise to oppose the motion. I find the motion quite cute, given it was the former Liberal Olsen government that privatised our electricity market. It was the former Marshall Liberal government that privatised our backup generators and failed to deliver its promised cuts to average electricity bills; and it was the former Liberal Prime Minister, 'Scotty from Marketing', who labelled our big battery 'the big banana' and carried a lump of coal into federal parliament and told us not to be scared. Well, what we should be scared of is the complete policy vacuum when it comes to the Liberals and energy.

Let me run through some of the inaccuracies in this motion. I will start with paragraph (a). The premise underlying this claim is incorrect. The Australian Energy Regulator's most recent Annual Retail Markets Report found that South Australian electricity prices are among the lowest in the National Electricity Market. The AER report for 2022-23 recorded that SA households with average consumption and contracted to the median of market offers would pay $2,044 a year. This was below Tasmania at $2,623, below New South Wales at $2,169 and below the ACT at $2,058. In the AER's analysis, only Queensland householders paid less. The AER did not record equivalent data for Victoria, WA or the NT.

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Ms HOOD: The AER found that the increase—

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Morphett is called to order.

Ms HOOD: —in prices in SA of 12 per cent from the year before was less than the increase in New South Wales, which was up by 21 per cent to 28 per cent. Queensland was up 23 per cent, Tasmania was up 18 per cent, and the ACT was up 14 per cent.

In paragraph (b), claims of inaction on the part of a Labor administration show just how little attention to reality is being paid by the Speirs Liberal opposition. The opposition would do well to consider the track record of both the former Marshall Liberal government here in SA and that of their colleagues in the Liberal-National Coalition in Canberra. At the federal level, the Coalition had some 22 different attempts at an energy policy but failed to agree amongst themselves on even one coherent policy, which would have given investors the certainty required for the long-term capital expenditure typical of the sector.

Here in SA, the Liberal Party went to the 2018 election promising they would deliver a $302 per year reduction in electricity bills for the average South Australian household. The Liberals set the comparison point for their promise as the 2016-17 prices recorded by ESCOSA in the annual retail price comparison report. That price was $1,976. At the conclusion of the Liberals' four years in government, ESCOSA's 2021-22 report recorded the average price at $2,041. That is, rather than a $302 cut to household bills, the Liberals presided over a $65 increase in bills. Of course, the Liberals continued to attempt to fudge their failure by choosing another starting point than the one that they had themselves selected—

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Morphett!

Ms HOOD: —and then taking an out-of-sequence special report they commissioned from ESCOSA, arbitrarily dated 6 December, rather than the end of financial year, as conventionally earmarked by ESCOSA—just shifting the goalposts.

During their period in office, the Liberals staked enormous faith in the interconnector to New South Wales, Project EnergyConnect, to deliver lower prices. They went as far as providing $43 million in funding for early works in New South Wales—

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Ms HOOD: —as part of some $65 million allocated to advance the project. Back in 2020, modelling for Project EnergyConnect estimated that, without the interconnector, wholesale electricity prices in New South Wales would be consistently about $20 per megawatt hour cheaper than in South Australia, through to 2035. However, New South Wales' reliance on increasingly less reliable, ageing coal-fired generation, in comparison to the dominance of renewable energy generation in South Australia, has reversed the price difference.

The AER reported that volume-weighted average wholesale prices were lower in SA than in New South Wales for the calendar years 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023. On the Australian Securities Exchange, the base futures contracts showed much the same result.

For the next four years, through to the end of 2027, the average quarterly contract price is just under $82 per megawatt hour in SA and just over $100 per megawatt hour in New South Wales. That means, under the Liberals' grand plan to lower costs, SA will be connecting to a jurisdiction where prices are running about $20 higher than here, rather than $20 lower than they were expecting. This comes as Project EnergyConnect's budget blew out from first estimates and its delivery target fell further and further behind, especially on the New South Wales side.

Then, of course, during the Marshall years, not a single generation project in SA achieved final investment decision through to being in operation—not one. Instead of strengthening reliability—

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Ms HOOD: —they weakened it by selling off the state-owned generators, the 277 megawatts of power that should have been kept in reserve.

Mr Patterson interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Morphett is warned.

Ms HOOD: Under the previous Labor administration, South Australia's electricity grid was strengthened. We underpinned investment in the Hornsdale Power Reserve, what was then the biggest grid-scale battery in the world, and which has become a global template for managing the transition, but make sure you listen to 'Scotty from marketing', who thinks it is simply a big banana.

AGL made the final investment decision to build the Barker Inlet power station, notable as the last time the private sector made a merchant investment in generation in the nation. Under the Malinauskas government, we are facilitating and expediting investment. We have created the Hydrogen and Renewable Energy Act to ensure an orderly rollout of projects, and we are investing in the Hydrogen Jobs Plan.

I will now move to part (c). One of the greatest arguments we have always had with our opponents is that renewable energy is cheaper, it is cleaner, and it is the way of the future. What we are attempting to do, like we did with the big battery, is store our overabundance of renewable energy during low demand periods like the middle of the day. Batteries are suitable for short durations, but to get to 100 per cent net renewables by 2030 we need a renewable form of long-duration energy storage.

When the Liberals inherited a grid with an oversupply of renewable energy, what did they do? Well, they put in place a system to actually turn off mum and dad's rooftop solar remotely, literally washing renewable energy down the drain. Rather than just earthing that energy and turning it off—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Ms HOOD: —or not producing that energy, our plan is to manufacture hydrogen and store it. At times of peak demand, you are able to use that stored energy in a gas-fired turbine designed to lower wholesale power prices in the spot market. Those flow through to everyone.

In 2017, Labor commissioned a study into South Australian green hydrogen, and established A Hydrogen Roadmap for South Australia. Either the Marshall government was already on autopilot by this stage or they saw merit in our work and contributed to it by publishing the Hydrogen Action Plan in 2019. But fast-forward to today, we see a complete backflip from those opposite, who are now calling it 'experimental'.

Climate change is real. The release of carbon into the atmosphere by human endeavour is causing the heating of the planet. We need to decarbonise our electricity generation and we are doing that by embarking on new technologies. We are investing in infrastructure and we are investing in policy work, like through our recent green paper and upcoming white paper on the energy transition. Members opposite can watch or get on board. I oppose the motion.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (11:37): I have heard a lot about energy in this place, and that was interesting.

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: I am only just starting, so do not worry, you can have your go. I move to support this motion by the shadow minister, the member for Morphett:

That this house—

(a) notes that South Australian working families and small businesses are enduring some of the highest power prices in the country under the Malinauskas Labor government;

(b) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their inaction resulting in driving sky-high power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis; and

(c) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their costly, experimental hydrogen power plant, that will not reduce power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses, as their only energy policy.

I did note that the previous contribution from the member for Adelaide was interesting, and it sounds like it was written by the minister, the member for West Torrens, or someone from his office.

Mrs Hurn interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: No dispute. There are a lot of facts around energy that were missed out.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Mr PEDERICK: There were a lot of facts that were missed out in that contribution, like the day we were here in September 2016 and the lights went out. Not just here—

Mrs Hurn: Who was in government then?

Mr PEDERICK: Yes, who was in government then? The Labor Party. The Labor Party presided over the only statewide blackout that has ever happened. They forget to talk about that. They forget to talk about that, and—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order!

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: You can have a go.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Elizabeth! The member for Wright!

Members interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: They are so excited about it they want to contribute now. The whole state—you almost have to be a magician to pull off a stunt like that. It was stupid of the policy to do the early closure of the Port Augusta coal-fired power plants, and we are seeing that policy failure relate across the rest of Australia, especially on the eastern section of power that we are connected to, because of policy issues around shutting down coal too early.

People are also demonising gas, which is outrageous, because we will need gas as a transition fuel for the next 30 years minimum. We saw that with the removal of those major power plants at Port Augusta. My understanding is that when they were operating they operated under a system where there were essentially five circuit breakers for the state, so you would not lose the whole state.

What we had in September 2016 was the whole state go out. We saw Adelaide gridlocked, we saw the power out on the Far West Coast, we saw the power out through the Mid North, we saw the power out through the Yorke Peninsula, we saw it out through the Upper South-East, through the Murraylands and the Riverland and all the way down the South-East. It was atrocious to think that the government could preside over a power supply that did that to the state. It is the Labor Party that fully owns that.

As I said, some people in this place try to demonise gas. Well, we are going to need gas for a long time, and we are going to need gas alongside those privately built, built by private investment—and a lot of offshore investment has come in for the wind farms, the solar farms. Let us note that a lot of those do not go up without some opposition; some people are more than happy to get the rebates paid for these energy projects, but there are issues at times. I note that about 200 megawatts has now gone in at Tailem Bend, and that goes straight into the Heyward interconnector that goes into Victoria.

Solar and wind are great things, but they are variable, and that is why we have to have sustainable practices in place to have a level of base load power in the background. We probably need about 30 per cent to 40 per cent of base load power somewhere in the system running all the time, and that is the whole idea with EnergyConnect, which the Minister for Energy and Mining used to support. He used to support that proposal, but changed his mind completely when we took it is a policy to the 2018 election.

Thankfully it went through the processes, and my understanding is that most of the infrastructure is being built on this side of the border to New South Wales. That is a fantastic project to interconnect our renewable energy, our 60 per cent to 70 per cent of wind and solar generated in this state, to those other forms of power in New South Wales, whether that be those ageing coal-fired power stations or the gas-fired power stations, because we are linked to all that eastern grid—that is just the way it works—right down through that connector to Tasmania.

It just make sense to get this EnergyConnect interconnector in place so that when we are generating that renewable energy—and we see reports of more and more wind and solar going in all the time—when we have an overabundance of it, we can export it so that we have clean energy use not just in South Australia but throughout the country.

However, it is a simple fact that if the wind is not blowing and the sun is not shining we need to get the power from somewhere else. So we are hooked up to a major state like New South Wales; obviously we have the Heyward interconnector hooked up that comes down through my area in the South-East, and you have Murraylink in the Riverland that connects through there as well, and these are vital parts of the whole connection strategy.

Then we go to this dream of hydrogen, over in Whyalla. It would be great if I could see it would work, but when I go to forums where there are very learned people from universities, professors and the like, and I ask the question, 'Will it work?', they say, 'Well, we don't know how.' That concerns me. That concerns me when you have a government that has already put up $593 million of South Australian taxpayers' money—because governments do not have their own money; they have taxpayers' money—to pay for this hydrogen power plant.

We have already seen them cut the amount of storage they are going to have, there is no money in there for transmission lines and, if you have the people who know what they are talking about saying that it is experimental and saying that they do not know how it is going to work, that concerns me—it concerns me greatly. Certainly for the proponents, the people who want net zero by 2050, we probably need small modular nuclear reactors to get us to that 40 per cent of generation, to get us through to the future, if people are deadly serious about generating clean energy and getting that net zero status.

I was pleased to be part of a government for the time we were there—would have been great if it were longer—that not only reduced power prices but did not suffer the outrageous event of having a statewide blackout in this state, and we worked hard on progressing policies like EnergyConnect, which the current Minister for Energy and Mining, the member for West Torrens, used to support.

He uses weasel words on the radio now to circle around it, but he knows deep down that that supply line, when it gets built through to New South Wales, will support South Australian private people. The hydrogen plant in Whyalla will support industry—if it works, and it is a big 'if'—but there is no promise of lowering costs for the hardworking South Australians in the general public. I condemn the Malinauskas Labor government for the way it has managed power in the state.

Mrs HURN (Schubert) (11:46): I rise in support of the member for Morphett's motion, which states:

That this house—

(a) notes that South Australian working families and small businesses are enduring some of the highest power prices in the country under the Malinauskas Labor government;

(b) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their inaction resulting in driving sky-high power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis; and

(c) condemns the Malinauskas Labor government for their costly, experimental hydrogen power plant, that will not reduce power prices for South Australian working families and small businesses, as their only energy policy.

I would like to focus on part (b) of this motion, which speaks to the significant cost-of-living pressures that people from all over South Australia are enduring. It is not just in relation to the sky-high energy prices that we are seeing in South Australia. Whether you look at electricity prices, inflation or mortgages, people are desperately crying out for relief, and that is something we are not seeing from the Malinauskas Labor government.

We had hoped that some relief would be provided on the back of last year's state budget. As an opposition, we were calling for there to be some significant cost-of-living relief, but that was not forthcoming for the people of South Australia or for the people who are doing it tough in my local community. In fact, it really did nothing to ease the cost of living for South Australians. The typical household received little to no support, and that is despite the fact that at that time energy prices were the highest in the nation.

In fact, as the member for Morphett has already identified, the average South Australian family is around $20,000 worse off under this government than they were under the former Liberal government. That is around $400 a week, and that is so significant to the hardworking families not just in my community of the Barossa Valley and the northern Adelaide Hills but right across South Australia.

When you think about the Barossa Valley and the Adelaide Hills, people often make assumptions that they are an extraordinarily affluent community, and in many ways they are. We produce some of the most amazing wine in the world, but people work extraordinarily hard, and they are going through a really tough time at the moment, particularly if we look at what is happening in the wine industry and, more broadly, in the economy.

There are businesses and families who are coming into my office in tears, worried about opening their energy bills. That is not a word of a lie. I have spoken with countless families who are literally scratching their heads wondering how they can squeeze more blood from the stone, because they are so tight on their family budget and they just do not know where else to turn. That is why we need to see that cost-of-living relief.

I also have businesses in my local community that have opened their energy bills. Someone in my local electorate has a six and a half thousand dollar quarterly bill; they are seriously thinking about closing their doors on Sundays. This is a relatively new business which has expanded. It is a fantastic, strong, local business. They are just wondering what they can do next.

These are the real-life impacts that having super-high energy prices in South Australia have, not just on families but on businesses. When you start to see the sheer pain and anguish on people's faces, you need to have a government that is going to act to deliver some relief. That is what we are not seeing from the Malinauskas government, and that is exactly why on this side of the house we are proudly supporting the member for Morphett's motion.

I think it is safe to say that at the last election we were pretty surprised that the Labor Party had not one single policy that had any focus on actually putting downward pressure on household bills or on the electricity bills of the people of South Australia. All they had was this hot air dream of a hydrogen power plant that cost around half a billion dollars—which, now that we look at the figures and the detail, we know is a very modest assumption.

Despite question after question after question from the opposition about what this hydrogen power plant dream will do to lower prices for families and businesses, they cannot say that it will—because it will not. In fact, the only energy policy that the Labor Party has is this hydrogen power plant that will not lower anyone's prices in South Australia. That is just the biggest load of hot air that we have ever seen in this chamber.

I think it is clear that we are seeing a return of the same old Labor Party who not only governed over the only statewide blackout that we have seen in the history of our state but also delivered and governed over the highest energy prices in South Australia. We are just seeing the return of the same old Labor.

It does contrast quite starkly, I think, with the approach of the former Liberal government, who in its short four years took a practical and proactive approach to put that downward pressure on energy prices. It did so knowing the real impact that has on families and on small businesses. Whether that was the interconnector or the Home Battery Scheme that the Labor Party crazily got rid of, this was so successful in local communities. It encouraged people to put their storage on the side of their house. What does the Labor Party say? 'No, we're just going to put all our eggs in the hydrogen energy pipedream basket,' knowing that it is not going to lower energy prices for households or for businesses.

In closing, and in support of the member for Morphett's motion, I do really hope that the Premier and the government use this next state budget as an opportunity to provide some cost-of-living relief for the people of South Australia. Our energy prices are among some of the highest in the nation and we simply cannot afford to be going down this same trajectory.

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (11:53): Thank you to those who contributed. It is an important topic that should be discussed in parliament, because there is no denying that energy prices are having a crippling impact on households and on businesses as well. It is interesting in terms of some of the debate around now. I thank the member for Hammond and the member for Schubert for describing businesses coming to them, which have based their business models around a certain price of electricity. The feedback I have, also, is that electricity prices are now becoming quite substantive compared to the rent they are paying. Usually the rent was the biggest segment; now electricity prices are getting up there. It is really troubling.

The member for Adelaide talked about energy prices and tried to diminish the work that the former Liberal government did in bringing down prices by $421, saying, 'The promise that was made only referred to the 2016-17 year and it didn't mention that the then minister put prices up by another $268 for that year, so you have to cover that in your $302.' Actually, the real results between June 2018 and December 2021 saw prices going down by $421.

That was outlined again by the member for Adelaide saying that wholesale prices in South Australia compared with New South Wales came down in 2021. I remember the quarter 4 wholesale results in South Australia were the cheapest in the nation. Compare that with the quarter 3 results in 2023, when South Australia's wholesale energy prices were the highest in the nation—the only state where wholesale electricity prices per megawatt were in three digits, at $114. The energy minister was trying to defend it on radio, saying, 'The interconnector wasn't working for a few days, and that put prices up by $20 odd, so if that hadn't have happened we would have been okay.' But when you look at the facts, and you take $20 of the $114, we still would have been the highest.

That also draws attention to the importance of having a second interconnector, because when the interconnector to Victoria is down South Australia is effectively islanded, and that is when there are big issues. We know there are issues with stability, with frequency. All that costs money to keep the lights on, and that flows through to energy bills. Having a second interconnector which, as has been said, is connecting the South Australian portion of it to the border, has now been done. That is going to be important for us going forward.

New South Wales has different weather patterns which are complementary, so from a system-wide basis it will help prices in South Australia come down. The modelling shows that it is even more: it is predicted to help bring prices down by $127. So really the only hope on the horizon for households that prices will come down is from Liberal initiatives that are coming through.

If I could just talk through more about the importance of a second interconnector, when the Heywood one went down in November 2022 when there was that big storm that came through here and knocked it out, we were again islanded for a number of weeks, and prices skyrocketed. That came through to bills. If we had had the New South Wales interconnector running, if you have a second one, we are not as susceptible to that. With the Victorian blackout only a couple of weeks ago, where 500,000 households blacked out in Victoria, Heywood tripped, and again we were islanded. We were susceptible. Having a second interconnector for redundancy makes all the difference.

Of course, that was also attracting investment into renewable energy generation here. At Goyder South Neoen invested massively in renewable energy generation—$3 billion worth, up to 1,200 megawatts of wind generation. They said two-thirds of that investment was because there was the interconnector there. They said it would be impossible to have done that without it.

So they are vital initiatives taken by the former Liberal government to help bring prices down. We had a focus on power bills for households and for businesses that is lacking on the part of those opposite. They are just out for the announcements. I put the motion and look forward to support from everyone in this house.

Motion negatived.

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