Page 1122 - Week 03 - Thursday, 26 February 2009
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Bill agreed to in principle.
Detail stage
Clauses 1 to 3, by leave, taken together and agreed to.
Proposed new clause 3A.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (4.30): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name on the green paper which inserts a new clause 3A [see schedule 2 at page 1146]. This is the first of a series of three amendments that I intend to move in relation to this part of the act. They speak to the desire of the Greens to hold the government to account on revisiting the application of this scheme to medium and large-scale application.
We have had assurances from the minister that stage 2 of this legislation will be addressed by 1 July this year and that stage 2 will address issues including the sizes of installations, a scheme-wide cap and the setting of the premium rate for installations beyond microgeneration scale. As I mentioned in my earlier comments, we would like to add to that list differentiated rates for different technologies.
I take the minister’s comments in good faith; I think the minister has the intention of ensuring that this scheme does have the opportunity to develop the industry cap that I was speaking of earlier and I look forward to working with the government on that second phase. However, I am concerned in this context that today the government has included a new clause 5B(2) in its legislation, in the application of the act. So right at the front of the act, where it is talking about the objects—what these actually look like, what its intentions are—it has inserted a section that explicitly limits the scope of the act to exclude medium and large-scale generation.
I presume what is going to have to happen is that, when we come here in July, we are going to have to take this section back out. The government thinks that leaving clause (c) in section 8, as we are proposing, will send a mixed message. But the question I would put out there is this: what is this in-and-out process that we are about to undertake? What sort of message is that sending if it is not a mixed one?
We do share with the government the desire to get this scheme right for medium and large-scale systems. We are concerned that there is a potential here for delay or for winding back the provisions that were in the original act, which Mr Gentleman championed and which are proven policy to grow jobs in the renewable energy sector.
It is unfortunate that the word “reckless” has been introduced into today’s debate. I do not think that anybody in this chamber has a reckless intention with regard to this legislation. The only thing that is reckless is to backslide on building a medium to large-scale industry in this city. The only thing that is reckless is to not build clean energy sources for the future. The thing that is reckless is to not diversify our energy supply. These are the things that are reckless. There has been no debate in this chamber and there have been no amendments put forward that speak to reckless behaviour at this point in time.
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