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Thursday, 28 August 2008 |
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Mr MIKE BAIRD (Manly) [4.25 p.m.]: It is an absolute privilege to speak on this matter today. Members have a case study on what is wrong with this State. For the benefit of members of the Government, leadership starts with honesty. A week or two before the last election the Premier and Michael Costa said that privatisation of the electricity industry was not on the agenda. Today they had the hide to talk about funding that can no longer go ahead. The Government makes announcements without knowing that funding is in place to deliver on them. Is the Government saying it can make whatever announcements it wants whenever it wants without having to pay for them? That is what the Iemma Government is delivering for us.
What has the mismanagement of the electricity sector cost the people of this State? In the past 15 years the population of New South Wales has grown by hundreds of thousands of people. How has this strategic Government responded? It has not provided one new capacity of generation. Not surprisingly, supply and demand are getting closer. The emissions trading scheme [ETS] is not a new phenomenon: it has not just appeared. If the Iemma Government had paid attention to global developments it would have seen that climate change is an increasing concern. It has responded with tokenism. In Europe an ETS was introduced in 2005. If the Iemma Government had decided to take that issue seriously it might have realised the impact on the sale of the State's assets. I think the Premier wanted to sell them but he was paying no attention to the big global development of ETS. That means that today we do not know the value of the assets the Government is trying to sell. A reserve price cannot be placed on the assets because the Government has no idea what is the biggest cost to the generators and no idea when emissions trading will introduced in Federal Parliament. That means that under the model proposed the assets could be sold for an unknown price at any time in the worst market in 20 years.
During the Government's 13 years in office it has taken $11 billion, which equates in the Owen report to a new generator plus the necessary retrofitting, in dividends but what has it done with them? It has not strategically applied those funds to future infrastructure. It has used those funds for short-term expediency and announcements and at no time has it taken the future energy needs of this State seriously. That is why we are in the position we are in today. Electricity prices in this State are increasing because of the Premier and his management. The Government has not invested in infrastructure, retrofitted generators and considered coal contracts. The energy and other prices will increase because of the Premier and the Treasurer.
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