Interview with Paul Culliver, ABC Newcastle

PAUL CULLIVER: Well if you look ahead for the next 10 years in Newcastle and the Hunter, you are going to see huge change in transition when it comes to our coal fired power, how we generate electricity, but also opportunities in manufacturing.

A Future Made in Australia is the name of the $22 billion the Federal Government wants to hand out over the next ten years to get industries going that otherwise might not happen in Australia. Let's find out how Newcastle and the Hunter might benefit.

Your guest this afternoon is Chris Bowen, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy. Good afternoon to you, Minister.

CHRIS BOWEN: Same to you, Paul, good afternoon, and good afternoon everyone.

PAUL CULLIVER: Let's start off by talking about energy bills. The big, of course, headline from the Budget, everyone is getting a $300 bill relief per household. I should point out that the Labor Government came to power on the promise that $275 reduction in energy bills would be achieved by 2025. Even with this rebate, that's not the case. Have you failed?

CHRIS BOWEN: That was modelling in 2021 about the impact of policies by 2025, and we're not giving up on the task of making energy cheaper by introducing more of the cheapest form of energy, which is renewables.

Of course that's being done in a more difficult circumstance because of the impact of the Ukraine War on energy prices around the world. But what we announced last night is $300 this year to everybody who has an energy bill, so in New South Wales, that's $3.5 million households, also small businesses, $325, and that's 322,000 businesses in New South Wales.

Obviously we're not suggesting that that fixes all the problems or is the be all and end all, but it's another important contribution, as well as the tax cuts which every taxpayer gets on 1 July due to the Government changes in policy. And also we saw some encouraging, again a long way to go, but encouraging news on energy prices with the latest, what we call the default market offer, which is showing energy prices coming down.

PAUL CULLIVER: Would that money that you're giving to every Australian household be better spent on making long term changes to our energy system to bring that price down?

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, it's not either or, Paul. We're doing both of those things. I mean in the last Budget, last year's Budget, we committed $1.7 billion in programs to help families electrify, so get off gas, go to renewables, solar, put renewable energy on social housing and public housing, $300 million for that, because people in public housing shouldn't miss out on the benefits of renewable energy, that's got to be matched by each state, and we've done that deal with New South Wales, they've matched our funding, so that's going to roll out. So we've done that.

Also in this budget we made a relatively modest but important investment in some regulatory changes, which we need to do with the states, so that people who qualify for a discount get it automatically to make it easier for people to change providers, that sort of thing. And we're doing a good deal of work as well on reforming the energy system, again in cooperation with the states, to take advantages of the opportunities that come from so many people having solar and more people having electric vehicles, which really does provide, with a properly managed system, big opportunities for savings for people, and a lot – we've got more work to do there, 'cause these are big changes, but the work is well underway.

PAUL CULLIVER: All right. Let's get into the issue of Future Made in Australia. $22 billion over ten years to incentivise new industries. Why does the government need to get involved here?

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, a couple of points, we have big natural advantages in Australia, but governments around the world are giving their industries assistance, and if we don't do that, our potential, our industries will miss out, and more and more industries will be attracted to the United States and other countries to do that work.

So that's jobs in, you know, Pennsylvania, not in Newcastle, and it's our job to ensure that all those jobs are in Newcastle and the Hunter, and it's already working, it's already working. You know, the down payment we put forward on the Future Made in Australia plan was Solar Sunshot, which is a policy to support solar panel manufacturing in Australia.

The day we announced that, a good Australian company called SunDrive announced that they would open, they would negotiate with AGL, but they would open their factory on the site of the old Liddell Power Station, and they will employ more people in making solar panels at Muswellbrook than were employed in the old Liddell Power Station.

Now that doesn't come about without policy, they have to make a decision; do we go to the United States or do we go to Australia? They wanted to stay in Australia, it's an Australian company, started by Australians, they preferred Australia. But there's no way that they could, in all good conscience, be true to their Board and their shareholders if they're getting such a good deal in the United States.

So that policy has changed that result. And that story that I just told you can be multiplied many, many times over with the right policy, and a Future Made in Australia is the right policy.

PAUL CULLIVER: That Solar Sunshot program you're talking about, a billion dollars being administered by ARENA, we actually interviewed the CEO of SunDrive on the day that was announced. He sort of told us on air that in fact it wasn't a done deal, he was just hoping that he could vie for some of that money, so were you pre empting, were you circumventing the ARENA process by announcing that SunDrive would get that money?

CHRIS BOWEN: No, we announced with SunDrive, and others, we had other companies at that launch as well. We were very clear that this was a process whereby ARENA would open bids, but SunDrive had enough confidence in that program that they announced that they would then enter into the lease negotiations with AGL to open up at the Liddell Power Station. So we were very clear about that, and SunDrive has been equally clear.

But you know, the proof's in the pudding. They're getting on with it, we're getting on with it. Obviously, the process has to work through, but the process is well underway.

PAUL CULLIVER: So projects, of course, and new technologies like green hydrogen, producing solar panels, which we really don't do much of in Australia, battery production, how do you know which technologies are worth the investment?

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, a couple of things. We've laid out some principles of our approach, and there was a paper we issued last night as well laying out further those principles. We've got to either have or been able to have a comparative advantage, it's got to be, you know, if it's important for our national security, for sovereignty, if it helps the regions, et cetera.

So obviously we can't do everything, we can't make every single thing in the renewable energy supply chain, we can't compete on every element, but we can compete on key elements, and we will do that.

So, we announced last night within Future Made in Australia, a Battery Breakthrough initiative, that's to encourage battery manufacturing in Australia, that's very important. A lot on green hydrogen, and this is very important for the Hunter, you know, the Hunter will be a hydrogen hub, we've already announced that. There's a lot of jobs there. Very important for Newcastle Port. Newcastle Port, as you know, is currently the world's largest coal export port. Coal exports will come under pressure as the world decarbonises, we need to provide alternative jobs. So hydrogen is very important for the Hunter. That's supported by our Hydrogen Headstart policy, another $2 billion announced there last night to support that.

Really, I mean Newcastle and the Hunter are very key recipients and beneficiaries of this Future Made in Australia policy.

PAUL CULLIVER: Chris Bowen, the Minister for Climate Change and Energy is your guest this afternoon here on ABC Newcastle, talking, of course, through some of the implications in the Budget.

I want to talk about a particular line item that I thought was interesting, $20 million roughly over seven years to improve community engagement and social licence outcomes through the permanent establishment of an Australian Energy Infrastructure Commissioner. Obviously social licence particularly around transmission lines, where renewable energy projects go around Newcastle and the Hunter has been a hot button issue. What is that job there ahead of this Commissioner to make sure that the community is on board, but also renewable energy projects are doing the right thing?

CHRIS BOWEN: Yeah, well, you summed it up. You know, we are in the middle of a big transformation. That doesn't always happen in a straight line or smoothly, and we do need to make sure we're bringing communities with us on that transformation.

And I'll be frank and say consultation with communities always hasn't always been as good as it should be on some of these things. I meet with many communities who say, "Look, we're not against this happening, we're not against, you know, we're not climate change deniers and we're not against this being built, but we want to be consulted, and we want real benefits for our community". And I think that's fair enough.

Now the Energy Infrastructure Commissioner's actually existed for quite a while, but what we're doing is sort of beefing up that role, making it permanent, providing that with more clear resourcing, because it is a key role to work with communities, with proponents.

The former Energy Infrastructure Commissioner, Andrew Dyer, wrote a report for me which I released in February with some recommendations about how it can be done better, which I've accepted, but that's a framework that we can build on and do better going forward to make sure communities benefit.

So, you know, for transmission lines going through a community, I want to see real benefits for that community from that transmission. I want to see real consultation with them, and I want to see real benefits for it, and that's going to be the Commissioner's job.

PAUL CULLIVER: Just finally, of course, tomorrow night we'll see Peter Dutton's Budget Reply. We're still waiting on the Opposition to outline their full nuclear policy, and indeed perhaps even name the sites where they want to see nuclear power built, perhaps even old coal fired power stations in the Hunter, we don't know yet. Obviously, you've been hypercritical of the idea of that policy.

When that policy's outlined by the Opposition, should that happen, what's the key question that you think the Opposition need to answer as to its viability?

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, they just need to start being honest with people. I mean they said they'd release a policy before the Budget. The Budget's been and gone. And, you know, if they want a nuclear policy, they can do that, but the Australian people should see that, they should see full details, full costings, and, as you said, full locations. And it's not good enough to say, "We'll tell you before the election".

I mean we had announced plenty of policy at this point, energy policy before this point in the cycle, last term, because we had a lot we wanted to do. Peter Dutton's announced not one single policy, certainly not one energy policy. He's been talking about nuclear for two years. All right, if you're so proud of nuclear, you're so confident it can work, give us the costings. We know that nuclear is the most expensive form of energy in the world. It is. So tell us how much you think it's going to cost, let the experts look at that. And tell the communities. If you want a nuclear power station at Bayswater or Liddell, all right, tell the people of the Hunter today, and let's have the debate. But they haven't done that. They should do that tomorrow night. It's a good opportunity for them.

PAUL CULLIVER: Minister, thanks for your time today.

CHRIS BOWEN: Great pleasure, good on you.