Press conference at Commonwealth Parliament Offices, Sydney

CHRIS BOWEN: Well after two years of promising details on their nuclear plan, 687 days after they first said they would give Australia risky reactors, weeks and weeks and weeks after promising that full details would be released imminently; today, the Liberal and National Party left many more questions than answers when it comes to their nuclear policy.

And I'll tell you why, because they know the answers are very bad.

Today, the Liberal and National parties, having promised an energy policy, released a list of sites with no costs, no details, no modelling. And they couldn't even release the number of gigawatts or megawatts that will be added to the energy system as a result of this policy. And they can't even confirm that these details will be released before an election, not after.

The Liberals and Nationals promised you a sensible energy plan. Instead, they're giving you a risky nuclear scam.

Now what do we know from today's announcement? The only details they’ve released is an admission that, even on their own timetable, which is hugely ambitious, they couldn't get a nuclear reactor up in Australia until 2035 or 2037.

Now that would be, in and of itself, the fastest nuclear roll out in the world, in a country that doesn't have a nuclear industry. But even on their own figures, they can't deliver before then.

They've also announced seven sites. Now, these sites spread across New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. We know this; of the seven proposed sites, in six of the occasions, on six of the locations, the owners aren't interested in hosting a nuclear power plant.

In six out of the seven sites, the owners have said they won't have it. So this policy fails at the first hurdle.

And we've also had Perrin Davey, the Deputy Leader of the National Party, say that if communities are against it, they won't proceed, and they won't be replaced with other sites. So where's the energy going to come from, Mr Dutton?

And we know this, there's a ban on nuclear power, not just in Australia, but at the state level, in New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland, and of course, five of the sites are in states with bans on nuclear power at the state level that won't be overturned.

Now Mr Dutton needs to explain how he would overturn those bans, not abuse the Premiers, not berate and complain about the Premiers, but outline what his own plan is.

So what we know is that nuclear power is risky. It's risky because it undermines investment in renewable energy. It's risky because it means relying on aging coal fired power stations for longer. It's risky because it would mean relying on coal fired power, which is increasingly unreliable for longer than we otherwise need to.

We know that nuclear is too expensive, too slow to build, and too risky for energy reliability.

Now the alternative is to stick with the plan to get to 82% renewables, to stick with the plan for the cheapest form of energy, which is renewables, to stick with the plan, which has seen renewable energy up by 25% since we came to office, which has seen 7.8 gigawatts of renewable energy added, which even today, as our Capacity Investment Scheme auction closes, sees more than 24 gigawatts of renewable energy bidding into an auction for six gigawatts.

This is the plan, the plan for cheaper bills, not more expensive energy that's slow to build, but renewable energy that can be delivered more quickly and more cheaply than this nuclear fantasy, this scam that Mr Dutton is trying to sell to the Australian people. Happy to take questions from journalists on the phone,

JOURNALIST: What would we see if progress on renewables stalled from the next election and then we didn't see nuclear generation come online until well into 2030 2040, at the earliest?

BOWEN: Are you saying, would we see that under a Liberal government?

JOURNALIST: What would be the scenario if that was to happen? Yes.

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, what we would see is a complete breakdown of investment in renewable energy, and that's what the Liberal and National Party wants. I mean, at least they're honest about this. They say they want to pause in renewable energy, and that is what this policy is designed to do, to slow or stop renewable energy, to rely on coal for longer as we wait for this nuclear fantasy to come about.

So we now have a clear choice. The Australian people now have a very clear choice, stick with the plan, or go with this uncosted, unmodeled fantasy that Mr Dutton is proposing today.

JOURNALIST: You got to give it to Mr Dutton, he’s giving it a crack. He's trying to do something here.

CHRIS BOWEN: I'll give this to Mr Dutton. He's delivered an alleged policy with no details, with no costings. I mean, if the Labor Party tried this from Opposition, we would have been torn apart, quite rightly.

You can't be a serious party of government and say we're going to build six nuclear power plants, or seven nuclear power plants on six sites where the owners don't want them, five sites where it's banned in state law and we'll get back to you about the details. And those details, by the way, might be post-election. I mean, they've said that they won't release their emissions targets until after the election. Now they're now saying they won't release key details about the nuclear plan till after the election.

Mr Dutton is not prepared to share the details, then the Australian people are entitled to reach the view that he's not serious when it comes to energy.

JOURNALIST: Regarding pollution. He said it’s not as important to him as it is to you.

CHRIS BOWEN: Well, that might be the most honest thing he’s said. Obviously action on climate, it's not important to Mr Dutton, but neither is reliability or cheaper bills, because that's what renewables provides.

JOURNALIST: The amount of money you need to spend to do offshore wind farms and so on, it's a big spend, though, is it still pie in the sky? That's going to work, that's going to deliver enough base power that we need?

CHRIS BOWEN: We're getting on with the plans, and those plans are rolling out as we speak. We're seeing offshore wind being developed and bids coming in to develop offshore wind as a result of our feasibility licenses being open. We're seeing more than 24 gigawatts of projects bid in for support on the Capacity Investment Scheme, which shows you that the pathway is there.

JOURNALIST: Around the world, we're seeing more renewable energy added in a couple of weeks than nuclear energy is added all year. The world's doing it. Australia's doing it. Mr Dutton wants to be cut off from the rest of the world.

CHRIS BOWEN: Mr Dutton’s isolated here. He's isolated from his State and Territory parties. He's isolated from the business community. He's isolated from the science community. He's isolated from sensible policy. Mr Dutton's out on his own.

JOURNALIST: He doesn't get up in the bed and get up every day to make a mistake. Why is he? Why is he doing?

CHRIS BOWEN: You'll have to ask Mr Dutton. I didn't come up with his fantasy. He did. You'll have to ask him, all right. Thank you.