The Coalition has blasted Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s move to appoint anti-nuclear ex-Liberal MP Matt Kean to a top climate role as a “political stunt”, while taking aim at Labor’s “off the rails” response to Peter Dutton’s new policy.
Shadow Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Birmingham has blasted Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s response to the Coalition’s nuclear policy.
The Albanese government and the Coalition have gone to war over nuclear power since Opposition Leader Peter Dutton announced his policy and suggested it would be more affordable than Labor’s renewables plan.
“I do think that the Prime Minister’s response to the Coalition’s nuclear policy has been completely, completely, off the rails,” Mr Birmingham told Sky News Australia.
“Albanese, rather than slapping down Labor figures who have been putting out these memes of three-eyed fish and koalas, seems to think it’s all just a joke.
“Well, it’s not a joke. Australia relies on nuclear technologies.
“There’s no place for this type of petty, pathetic scare campaign that Anthony Albanese is tolerating in the Labor Party.”
Speaking to Sky News Australia on Tuesday morning, the Nationals Senator said the appointment of former NSW Liberal politician Matt Kean as chair of Australia’s Climate Change Authority was clearly a political move.
Mr Kean, the former NSW treasurer who resigned from state politics just last week, was appointed as the head of the federal government’s climate change advisory board on Monday morning.
“Obviously it’s a political stunt,” Mr Canavan said.
“What we need is not political stunts – we need real solutions to the fact that people are paying now thousands of dollars more for their electricity bills under this government, despite this government promising that they would cut people’s power bills they have gone up.
“They don’t need a Matt Kean, a political appointee to a climate change authority, they need the government to invest in real forms of power like nuclear to bring down their power bills.”
Mr Canavan said the fresh appointment of former NSW Liberal politician Matt Kean as chair of Australia’s Climate Change Authority (CCA) was “obviously” a “political stunt”. Picture: Sky News Australia
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When asked about Mr Kean’s appointment and if it “made sense”, Mr Birmingham deflected from the motivations behind the Prime Minister’s decision, instead focusing on the importance of the Coalition’s nuclear energy proposal.
“I think what matters here are not the personalities but the policies,” he said.
“And the reality is that Labor’s policies are not working. Australians are paying much higher electricity bills than Labor had promised them and they’re paying a price for that.
“Labor’s targets, in terms of the rollout of renewables, are not hitting the rate that Labor had promised and that means we’re at a real risk of not hitting out emission reduction targets.”
The Coalition frontbencher said Opposition leader Peter Dutton had presented a “clear, long-term vision and a willingness” to take the “difficult decisions” in relation to opening up the discussion about nuclear energy, and in doing so had created a “more concrete, firm pathway” for how net-zero could be achieved by 2050.
Mr Birmingham was pressed on where nuclear energy would fit into the mix, having argued for large-scale renewable energy programs in the past.
“I think nuclear does play a key role in terms of providing the type of firming and base load energy which is particularly necessary for heavy industry, particularly necessary for us to keep a manufacturing and industrial base in Australia and to have reliability in the grid,” he said.
Mr Birmingham refused to comment on the political nature of the Prime Minister’s decision, instead focusing on the importance of the Coalition’s nuclear energy proposal. Picture: Sky News Australia
“But I’ve equally, absolutely been clear that large-scale renewables have continued to become more cost effective and competitive over time, I don’t resile from those comments, there have been a lot of subsidies, a lot of investment and support to get them to that stage.
“I expect there will continue to be investment, but it’s not happening as fast as the Labor party had planned or promised.”
Mr Birmingham said it would be “ridiculous” to sit in the interviewee’s chair and pull an emissions figure for 2030 out of thin air, but as a country, Australia should be “striving” to achieve the maximum reduction in emissions possible.
“If we could all click our fingers and say we’d be net-zero by 2030 that would be marvellous, but it’s not true and it’s not possible, the target is net-zero by 2050, we need to put in place the trajectory to get there with the best mix of technologies,” he said.
Mr Birmingham refused to comment on whether the target Mr Kean set for NSW while he was in government of 70 per cent by 2035 was achievable, and that he could not rule in or rule out different figures.
Mr Birmingham criticised the memes and Labor’s jibing of the Coalition’s push for nuclear power and said there was “no place for this type of petty, pathetic scare campaign”. Picture: Newswire/Gary Ramage
“The best way for the analysis on this to be done is with the tools, powers and resources of government, and done in a transparent way around what the implications will be for jobs, for our economy, the communities as well as for the environment,” he said.
“The government needs to be up front about these things.”
Mr Birmingham said Labor’s response to the Coalition’s nuclear energy proposal had gone “off the rails” and rebuked the Prime Minister for allowing members of his party to pretend it was “all a joke”.
“I do think that the Prime Minister’s response to the Coalition’s nuclear policy has been completely, completely off the rails,” he said.
Mr Birmingham criticised the memes and Labor’s jibing of the Coalition’s push for nuclear power, saying there was “no place for this type of petty, pathetic scare campaign” that the Prime Minister was “tolerating” within his party.
“Anthony Albanese, instead of slapping down Labor figures who have been putting out memes of three eyed fish and koalas and the like, seems to think it’s all just a joke, ” he said.
“Well, it’s not a joke.
“He should be shutting that down and ensuring that if he wants to argue against our policy he does so on economics and on science, not on some type of Simpsons-style scare campaign.”