Page 1904 - Week 05 - Thursday, 5 May 2011
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comments, will you reconsider your decision to keep the premium rate for the feed-in tariff scheme at 45.7c per kilowatt hour?
MR CORBELL: No, not at this time.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Seselja, a supplementary?
MR SESELJA: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Minister, why is it that your federal colleagues care about the cost of living pressures caused by their policies and you do not?
MR CORBELL: It is just not true, Mr Speaker. It is disappointing to see feed-in tariffs being used as a scapegoat for rising electricity prices. We know what the major drivers of rising electricity prices are and they are not feed-in tariffs. Indeed, feed-in tariffs contribute less than five per cent to the total amount of rising electricity prices nationally. It is the same here in the ACT. We know that the main factor driving the increase in electricity prices is the need to augment network distribution capacity because of growing demand for electricity across the national economy. We know that that is the major factor that is driving the uptake, the increase, in electricity prices.
The announcement of the decision today by the federal government is disappointing in that it signals a sudden shift in policy when, in fact, there should be—I think in the view of the solar industry and the renewable energy industry more generally—a gradual and clear pathway in terms of adjustment. But, that said, that is a prerogative and a matter for the federal government. But it is wrong to suggest and it is wrong to use feed-in tariffs as a scapegoat for rising electricity prices. The fact is the major element that drives increases in electricity prices is the need to augment existing generation and distribution infrastructure, not feed-in tariffs.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Smyth, a supplementary.
MR SMYTH: Minister, given that the ACT feed-in tariff scheme works on a gross basis, do you agree that your policy has increased electricity prices greater than necessary?
MR CORBELL: I do not agree that it has increased electricity prices greater than necessary. The fact is that feed-in tariff policy provides incentives for people to make the shift to renewable energy generation and, in doing so, creates jobs and activity in the local economy. And that has been the real success of the feed-in tariff scheme.
Is there a cost to consumers? Yes, there is. That has always been acknowledged. It has always been recognised. And that has been a very clear and careful consideration for the government in establishing its feed-in tariff policies.
But it surprises me that those opposite—like Mr Seselja who says, “I am of the generation that does not need to be convinced about issues around climate change,” and who spends every waking hour of his day when he comes to this place bagging a policy that creates jobs in a low carbon future, bagging a policy that is now being supported by thousands and thousands of households across the ACT, bagging a
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