Page 3027 - Week 07 - Thursday, 30 June 2011
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the cut-off date are not disadvantaged in accessing 100 per cent of the premium price. We agree with the minister, in his statements, in his speech, that we do not want to see people who, through no fault of their own, have not been installed by 1 September missing out if they have a good faith contract. It is absolutely fundamental that we honour those contracts.
We will impose a lower percentage of pay back, from 75 per cent to 66 per cent, from the date that was set for medium generators and from 1 June onwards for microgenerators. And we would restrict the minister to only decreasing the percentage for pay backs, not increasing it. That leaves extra flexibility for the minister to reduce the rate and potentially save more money for consumers.
Given the government’s blow-out of seven megawatts for the microgeneration scheme, or approximately $4 million, only eight megawatts capacity of the medium generation scheme is available, we are told. At the current rate determined by the government, and using the assumptions used by the ICRC to calculate the cost of the feed-in tariff scheme, the eight megawatts will cost approximately $3.7 million.
If we allowed the micro scheme access to the residual medium capacity of eight megawatts at the rate of 30.162c, or 66 per cent, the maximum cost of this scheme will be approximately $3.2 million. Our plan will save taxpayers up to $686,000 per year.
For all those reasons, and whilst our amendments will significantly, we believe, change and improve this legislation—for the reason that there should be a cushioning of the impact for industry, for the reason that our bottom line should improve the scheme to see energy users pay less, and for the reason that we believe that all existing contracts should be honoured—that is the rationale for our amendments. For that reason, and to do those things and achieve those things, we will be supporting this bill in principle today.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (4.04): I would like to thank Mr Seselja and the Canberra Liberals for their support on this matter and the constructive way that we have been able to discuss the nature of the bill that I have put forward and the amendments that Mr Seselja has proposed.
This bill is about providing a softer landing for the Canberra solar industry. That is done in comparison to the overnight cut-off that we saw where, as I predicted in the debate on this matter in this place earlier this year, unfortunately we hit a situation where, overnight, the industry hit a brick wall after only three months. We had had a suggestion that there would be an 18 to 24-month period to reach the cap. After only three months, that cap was reached and the brick wall was run into in a very spectacular way. This bill is about ensuring that that is smoothed out.
I acknowledge the comments that Mr Corbell has made about the external influences on the ACT scheme. Some of those are difficult for the government to anticipate, perhaps nigh-on impossible. Nonetheless, the reality is that the situation we find ourselves in is largely an artificial crisis that we have created for ourselves—or at least that this Assembly created for the solar industry through the imposition of a cap on this scheme.
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