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Secrecy, Power, and Big Pharma

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The Labor Government is running scared of scrutiny. Their atrocious bill to establish an Australian Centre for Disease Control (CDC) is significant legislation—and I’ll go so far as to say it’s the worst I’ve seen in my nine years in the Senate. It’s dangerous.

There were countless amendments that required answers, and many speakers were denied the opportunity to contribute. Serious questions remain unresolved.

The Albanese Government manipulated the speaking list to push One Nation Senators to the bottom. Just before it was my turn to speak, Labor guillotined the bill, preventing any further speeches from being delivered. I managed to use the debate on the guillotine to deliver part of my speech, which is the video you see here.

This marks a new low for the unscrupulous and arrogant Labor Government. The Greens should be ashamed for supporting the guillotine on such an important bill.

The CDC will provide the government of the day with cover to do whatever it wants. It’s expensive, it will control dangerous research, and the reporting and scrutiny provided in this bill are virtually non-existent. This is unacceptable.

One Nation will repeal this bill.

Transcript

Yet again, a guillotine stops debate immediately before I was scheduled to speak against this bill, and after pushing all three One Nation senators, who were going to speak, to the bottom of the list. One Nation opposed the guillotine. We want to know why the coalition and the Greens join with Labor in supporting big pharma.  

Senator Canavan interjecting— 

Senator ROBERTS: Except Senator Canavan. Thank you, Senator Canavan. This is significant legislation, and I’ll go so far as to say that it’s the worst legislation I’ve seen in nine years in the Senate. It’s dangerous. There are many, many amendments that need answers, and there are many speakers that missed out. There are many questions.  

The first question I have for you is: why are you avoiding scrutiny? This is half a bill! The bill establishes what the CDC director can do. It does not, though, establish what the director cannot do. There’s nothing in this legislation to establish rules around the following, so can you please clarify. What is the process for determining where the CDC will be located and what the site features should be—what protections for the community? What research will be conducted at the CDC, if any? Will that research include gain-of-function research, which was the cause of the COVID outbreak in 2019, which killed millions of people? Who will own the taxpayer funded CDC research? There are no answers to these questions. These are fundamental. What research will be conducted in cooperation with research facilities overseas, and what countries should be excluded on national security grounds? Start with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and exclude Anthony Fauci’s haunts, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and America’s National Institutes of Health, and Fauci’s colleagues including Ralph Baric and Peter Daszak. 

Will live animal testing be conducted, and, if so, on what animals and how? Will research be conducted on behalf of commercial corporations, and, if so, who owns the taxpayer funded research. What annual reporting will be produced to alert the parliament and the Australian people about the risks to which they’re being exposed? If the CDC facility handles sensitive material, what level of containment will be used, and what will be the process for investigating and rectifying breaches? And what is the purpose of and limit to research? Is it just ego—’Look at what we can do!’—or is there a genuine medical outcome they’re working towards? 

We know the CSIRO at its Geelong facility is already conducting risky experiments on deadly viruses such as Ebola, and they’re experimenting on animals. Those are my questions. Additionally, what’s happening with taxpayer funds? We know the CSIRO monetises its research, or used to, and we know lately the CSIRO has been publishing the results of their research allowing corporations to piggyback off that research free of charge, saving them years in developing new drugs from which the Australian taxpayers will have no commercial benefit. The taxpayers pay and get no benefit. This is the state of medical research in Australia. What impact will the CDC have on the CSIRO? We don’t know. The bill doesn’t set out these matters. It’s a glaring omission. 

The minister says the Australian CDC will undertake technical and advisory functions based on its public health expertise and knowledge and access to relevant information. What expertise? It hasn’t started yet. You’re assuming bureaucrats and health officials actually have the expertise and knowledge to perform these studies, yet there’s nothing in this bill to say they must have that knowledge—nothing. This is a pretence to give ‘thank you’ jobs to COVID era health officials who have a track record of very dangerous, dishonest and inhuman decisions. These bureaucrats will be given powers. The Chief Medical Officer, for example, must be a doctor, but the director of the CDC does not. What could possibly go wrong? 

Continuing cover ups from the government and freedom of information—an issue which One Nation senator for Western Australia Senator Whitten has raised is the changes the bill makes to the Freedom of Information Act. The bill amends the Freedom of Information Act 1982 to exempt the CDC from freedom of information applications to which the same documents are currently open. I wonder if this is to cover up information from the COVID years or just to get ahead of the next lab leak. 

Finally, I’ve already discussed sensitive biological agents with regard to Ebola. The CDC bill transfers responsibility for the Security Sensitive Biological Agents Regulatory Scheme from the department to the Australian CDC. This scheme regulates certain biological agents that are considered dangerous. Now, let’s take a closer look at this one. Who would decide if a biological agent is sensitive and subject to extra checks? The CDC. Who would be most likely to be importing sensitive biological agents like Ebola and heaven knows what else? The CDC. Who would now be their own regulator? You guessed it, the CDC. This is a recipe for no accountability, a recipe for disaster, a recipe for rampant, unbridled control over the people. 

Officially, this bill simply brings together powers spread across several departments into one place. If that’s really the case, why does the bill have a price tag of $250 million for the first three years and $73 million per year after that? Shouldn’t the cost of the CDC be offset through savings in other departments? If that’s all they intend, then that would be true. Clearly the Australian CDC will be doing much, much more. You’re given them the money to do it, and they’ll be doing it away from prying eyes and protected with freedom-of-information blocks and negligible reporting criteria, regulating itself and sending the bill to the taxpayers. In nine years in the Senate, this is one of the worst bills I’ve dealt with. Minister, I’ve given you many questions. I’d like some answers. 

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It’s Not Government Money — It’s Yours

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One of the most fundamental duties of a senator is to scrutinise the government — not just its words, but its actions. That means asking tough questions about how public money is spent, and demanding transparency when answers are withheld.

Let’s be clear: there is no such thing as “government money.”

Every dollar the government spends comes from taxpayers — from you, from your family, from every working Australian. Yet time and again, ministers dodge this truth. When asked directly, Minister Walsh couldn’t even say the word “taxpayer.” Instead, she danced around the issue, talking about “revenues” and “costed policies.” But the reality remains: it’s your money. And what’s happening with it? Billions of dollars are being funnelled into subsidies and climate schemes with no parliamentary scrutiny.

The government even refused to answer questions about an alleged fund linked to former Prime Minister Julia Gillard. I made no accusations – I just asked questions – yet the government doesn’t want those questions asked. This secrecy is becoming a pattern. Whether it’s Housing Australia or climate targets, Labor refuses to disclose where taxpayer money is going.

Meanwhile, the push for net zero continues — a policy introduced by the Liberals and Nationals – costing Australians billions. There’s no detailed plan, no milestones, no way to measure progress. Even the CSIRO can’t quantify the impact of human carbon dioxide on the climate.

So, what are we paying for? Australians deserve better. We deserve transparency. We deserve respect. And above all, we deserve to know how our hard-earned money is being spent.

https://youtu.be/nWGyg9fpVfk

Transcript

I rise to take note of Minister Ayres’s comment. One of the most fundamental parts of a senator ‘s job is to review and scrutinise the government. That’s why I support almost every single order for the production of documents, regardless of who moves it. Most importantly, scrutinising the government means scrutinising how the government is spending money—and, by the way, scrutinising the impacts of government policy on the national economy and on individual Australians is part of scrutiny of government. 

To build back on the first point, scrutinising how the government is spending our money: the government forgets that what it spends isn’t the government’s money; it’s taxpayer money. Minister Walsh recently couldn’t utter the word ‘taxpayers’. I asked her what government money was. She said it is about revenues and that the policy was fully costed. She twisted and turned and gave me several other answers, but she could not utter the words ‘taxpayers’ money’. There is no such thing as government money. It is all taxpayer money. As taxpayers, we all pay taxpayer money. It is Australians’ money. 

Last week I spoke in the Senate about Minister Bowen taking subsidies, completely away from parliamentary scrutiny. It was a cosy little deal worth billions of dollars. I mentioned a potential deal with a fund taken over by Julia Gillard, the former Labor prime minister. I made no imputations. I’m just saying we need to have a look at that data. The government is hiding, hiding, hiding and stopping scrutiny, stopping us from doing our jobs, which is a theme for this government. Too often the government is willing to waste hard-earned tax dollars. The minister has just been hauled in front of the Senate to explain because the government refused to answer where they’re spending taxpayer money. This is the second—we’ve just had discussions about Housing Australia—and the government has refused again. This secretive Labor government refuses to tell Australians where it’s spending its taxpayer money. Why the secrecy? Why the hiding? It’s not your money. It’s the Australians’ money. It’s because you don’t want Australians to know that you don’t treat taxpayer money with respect. 

Now we come to the second motion that Labor is trying to keep secret, on climate targets. There’s a backstory here that shows how incoherent the Liberals and the Nationals are. The motion is from the Liberal-National coalition asking the government to hand over documents in relation to the Climate Change Authority and their targets. Australians hear all the time that the Liberals and the Nationals want to ditch net zero, yet here’s a motion that the Liberal-National coalition pursues that’s criticising the government for not putting out information on net zero targets. This is insane. It’s almost as insane as the net zero pipedream. 

While the Liberals and the Nationals spin their wheels and try to figure out which way the wind is blowing, One Nation is clear. On this motion, One Nation says to the government, we’re not bothered about you handing over your net zero targets. We say, don’t bother pursuing net zero at all. All of these billions of dollars amounting to trillions of dollars and efforts to keep things secret are a waste of time and money. Every minute you spend making climate targets, bogging businesses down in green and blue tape and hamstringing our productive capacity harms the country. Give it up, government, and start putting Australians first. 

Remember that the Liberals and the Nationals introduced every major climate and energy policy, including net zero. You did it. That Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison introduced net zero after breaking his election promise to not pursue net zero. What about the government spending trillions on net zero without a detailed project plan—no milestones, no measures of progress, just leading Australia towards an economic cliff blindfolded. Worse, net zero is taking Australia to energy ruin without any policy basis. The CSIRO have never specified—and I’ve asked them repeatedly in personal sessions and in Senate estimates—the specific, quantified effect of human carbon dioxide on the climate. Without that, you can’t have a policy. Thus there’s no basis for policy cutting human carbon dioxide. That’s why there’s no way of measuring the progress of implementing climate and energy policies. That’s why you’ve got to keep it secret. That’s why you’ve got to hide it. I’ll continue my remarks on this topic in the future. 

Question agreed to. 

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Treasury Dodges Coal Price Questions

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Treasury officials dodge basic questions about Australian power station coal prices while claiming they “monitor” them for inflation forecasts. Despite promising to get back to me on notice, the officials refused to provide how much coal for generating electricity costs.

Australian coal prices for our power stations remain stable under long-term contracts, yet Treasury keeps pushing the narrative of high international prices to justify soaring electricity costs. Why hide the real numbers? Because cheap domestic coal exposes the true cost of the renewable energy transition to Australian families.

Time for transparency, Australian families deserve to know the real cost of their electricity and it’s not because of Ukraine.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: This is for the Treasury, on coal pricing. The Treasurer said in March, regarding Australian power station coal prices, that thermal coal burned in power stations in Australia was ‘more or less tracking’, according to Treasury’s December forecast, to be down about a third from a year ago. Do you track the price of thermal coal burned in power stations in Australia?  

Mr Yeaman: We look at overall market movements in coal prices both for export and for generation, yes, as part of our CPI forecast.  

Senator ROBERTS: How do you get that information on thermal coal prices in Australia for domestic use?

Dr Heath: In tracking coal prices on a regular basis, the most publicly available coal prices tend to be shipped coal. So if you’re looking—  

Senator ROBERTS: Exported coal?  

Dr Heath: Exported coal—that’s what is publicly available. The arrangements that individual coal-fired power plants have to access their coal means that the prices they pay could be quite different to those public prices. That’s not publicly available information, so we would have to basically go directly to the coal-fired power stations to find that information.  

Senator ROBERTS: I understand the local price is much lower because they’re locked into long-term contracts. So it’s a vague process. When you’re talking about power stations, is it only power stations that buy their coal or is it also the power stations that are at the mine mouth—where it just goes straight from the mine into the power station?  

Dr Heath: I think that’s getting to a level of detail that I don’t have.  

Senator ROBERTS: Could you take that on notice, please? 

Dr Heath: We can take that on notice, but I’m not sure— 

Senator ROBERTS: I’d like to know how you get that price—or, if you don’t get that price, that’s fine.  

Mr Yeaman: I am aware that we have in the past. Our colleagues at the department of climate change and also the department of industry, along with our colleagues at the Australian Energy Market Operator, look at prices by facility, and I think that does include those that get coal directly from the mine.  

Senator ROBERTS: So you get that information from those other agencies?  

Mr Yeaman: I’m not sure how systematised that is, but I’m aware we have in the past drawn information from those sources.  

Senator ROBERTS: What’s the latest figure you have for the price of thermal coal burned in Australian power stations?  

Mr Yeaman: If it’s that specific a question, I’ll take it on notice, if that’s okay.  

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Are you aware that the CSIRO uses a coal price of $11.30 a gigajoule in its GenCost studies to say that wind and solar are cheaper than coal?  

Mr Yeaman: We generally look at the GenCost report, but, for our purposes, we don’t tend to go down to that level of detail around their assumptions.  

Senator ROBERTS: So you’re not aware that CSIRO uses the coal price of $11.30 a gigajoule in GenCost?  

Mr Yeaman: I haven’t been aware of that and I’m not sure that my colleagues would be.  

Senator ROBERTS: Okay, I can accept that. Are you able to provide the aggregate figures for coal prices over the last five years, please?  

Mr Yeaman: We can certainly have a look and see what we can provide. 

Questions on Notice | June 2024

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A0011_Economics_2024-06-03_BudgetestimatesDownload
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Minister Makes ABYSMAL Defence of Net-Zero

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When government discounts expire, Australia will be facing their highest electricity bills ever.

This is despite CSIRO claims that wind and solar are the cheapest forms of electricity.

With the largest amount of wind and solar on the grid, electricity prices have never been higher – go figure. Australia is incredibly rich in resources and should be an electricity super power. 

Instead, we have Minister Ayres and the once respected Commonwealth Scientific Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) who continue to destroy our country.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: My questions are fairly short. CSIRO didn’t give a direct answer to my question on notice about the cost of Pioneer-Burdekin pumped hydro, but I have the latest figure the CSIRO is using for the Pioneer-Burdekin pumped hydro in Queensland: $12 billion. We now know the Queensland government internally have the actual cost at $36 billion—triple. Snowy 2.0 has blown out from $2 billion to $20 billion, and I forecast that in 2017. That’s if you include the connecting infrastructure—everything to turn the power on. Why do you continue to tell Australians this is a cheap pathway to follow when every step we take proves you wrong—repeatedly wrong. Why?

Dr Mayfield: These numbers are embedded in our GenCost report and, with every technology, we’re looking for actual projects to base our numbers on. I don’t believe we’ve been using the numbers for the Queensland project as part of that. Mr Graham can probably clarify that for me, but we update that on each cycle based on what’s actually happening out there. So the numbers are as up to date as they possibly can be, as we get more project information.

Senator ROBERTS: That worries me more—that they’re up to date. Your GenCost is nothing more than a fairytale. Considering the assumptions, when we include, then, all of the additional costs, like pumped hydro, that are needed to make it work in Australia, we’re not going to have a cheaper energy system, are we, under GenCost?

Dr Hilton: Chair, could I just object to the use of ‘fairytale’? I think that’s a pretty derogatory way of describing what is a well-considered report that has opened itself up to input from a large range of experts over an eight-year period and, I think, provides excellent guidance to the community about the levelised cost of energy.

CHAIR: I think you’ve put that—

Senator ROBERTS: As I said, when we go into the assumptions, it’s a fairytale.

CHAIR: Senator Roberts!

Senator Ayres: Can I just make a couple of comments about this? I think it’s—

Senator ROBERTS: The assumptions have been proven wrong repeatedly.

CHAIR: Senator Roberts!

Senator Ayres: It’s the kind of badgering of our key national scientific organisation that you should not do—you should not do. It’s an organisation that has served Australia well for decade after decade after decade. It is composed of scientists and staff who work diligently on these questions. It is, of course, open to people—particularly people who have got some peer-reviewed scientific background, but it’s open to people—to ask questions and to criticise the findings of the CSIRO and any other research institution. I don’t mind the scrutiny. I don’t think it does your cause any good when you ask these questions, but I don’t mind it. What I do mind is the use of derogatory language. The problem is it’s not just a One Nation Senator who does it. We sort of expect that. It’s the Leader of the Opposition who said on GenCost: It’s a discredited report—let’s be clear about it. It’s not relied on. It’s not a genuine piece of work.

Senator ROBERTS: Correct.

Senator Ayres: What is wrong with the Liberal and National Party that you allow a bloke to run the show who pours scorn—

Senator ROBERTS: Chair, this is taking up my time. It needs to stop.

CHAIR: Alright.

Senator Ayres: who pours scorn on science and engineering. It has it has got—

Senator ROBERTS: You’re just taking up my time to shut me down.

Senator Ayres: But you’re the one who applied the derogatory comments. It’s got to stop.

CHAIR: Minister!

Senator ROBERTS: It’s my opinion.

Senator Ayres: It’s got to stop.

Senator ROBERTS: It’s my opinion.

Senator Ayres: It’s got to stop. It’s disrespectful.

CHAIR: Minister. Senator Roberts, can I just have a conversation with you?

Senator ROBERTS: Sure.

CHAIR: You still have the call. You’ve asked a question in a certain way. Dr Hilton has put some comments on the record about that. The minister has put some comments on the record about that. My job is just to make sure that you ask your questions in a courteous way. And you can ask questions about GenCost. I’d just ask that you put them in a courteous way.

Senator ROBERTS: Let’s get a move on to the next question. Can you guarantee—guarantee—the entire electricity system, from generation to poles and wires to the electricity bill to the cost of taxpayers, is going to be cheaper if we continue down your pathway? The Renewable Energy (Electricity) Act was passed in the year 2000 under the Howard LNP government. So for more than 20 years, government has forced an increasing amount of wind and solar onto the electricity grid. I have here a graph of the cost of electricity over the past 20 years. It has tripled, largely under your guidance. Can any one of you experts here please tell me in which year on this graph putting more wind and solar onto the grid has brought down the price of electricity? I’m happy to table this.

CHAIR: Thank you, Senator Roberts.

Dr Hilton: Senator, we don’t have a pathway; we provide data to our elected representatives for them to make policy decisions about our electricity system. We’ll continue to do that through the GenCost report in a manner that is objective and that is open to feedback with each iteration of the report, as it’s been over the last eight years, and it’s up to our elected representatives to make the policy decisions about pathways, as they’ve done over the last 30 years, as you showed in your graph.

Senator ROBERTS: So you can’t guarantee a pathway.

Senator Ayres: It’s not up to Dr Hilton or the CSIRO—

Senator ROBERTS: The CSIRO has advised there are three pathways, Senator.

Senator Ayres: They don’t run the energy strategy of the Commonwealth or the states. They provide expert advice on what the cheapest technologies are in the Australian context. That’s what they do. They are scientists. They provide advice. It’s a matter for government to follow it. It’s not their pathway. The government—and the private sector too—takes advice about what the cheapest forms of technology are, and if you persist in supporting the most expensive ones, that’s a matter for you.

CHAIR: Okay. Thank you, Minister.

Senator ROBERTS: Let’s take the word of the RBA governor this morning. She said the key factor is supply and demand. When you add electrification to this, what the hell are we going to do with prices? Are you aware that higher electricity prices cascade and multiply throughout the economy, devastating manufacturing, devastating agriculture, devastating household bills when you remove the subsidies. Are you aware that in every nation in the world, increasing solar and wind increases electricity prices? The real-world data shows that. Within you, does this fact about increasing solar and wind driving increasing electricity prices in every nation across the globe raise any questions and, if so, what questions?

Senator Ayres: Senator Roberts, it’s—

Senator ROBERTS: I’m asking.

Senator Ayres: I’m answering. If you’d approached this issue in a straightforward way, you would’ve explained that the graph that you waved around is the electricity CPI. Right? It’s not the real cost over time; it’s got inflation built into it. If you were straightforward about it, you would pose the counterfactual: what happens if you put more expensive than the—

Senator ROBERTS: I just told you what happens, around the world. Every nation that increases solar and wind increases electricity prices.

Senator Ayres: What the government has to do, serious government that’s actually interested in the future of manufacturing—we will need more electricity.

Senator ROBERTS: The most important factor in the manufacturing cost is electricity, and you’re driving the price up.

Senator Ayres: We’re going to build more manufacturing, and we’re going to drive the price down by delivering more supply and a modern generation facility.

Senator ROBERTS: When you add the demand of—

Senator Ayres: You can hold up your silly graph as long as you like, but it doesn’t alter those facts.

CHAIR: Okay. I’m about to—

Senator ROBERTS: One more question.

CHAIR: Hello, everyone! I’m about to share the call, but I take Senator Roberts’s point that we’ve also had some long answers.

Senator ROBERTS: I’m on my last question.

CHAIR: Ask your final question.

Senator ROBERTS: The federal government says it relies on the CSIRO for advice on energy and future climate. Do you take responsibility for destroying Australia’s position as the cheapest supplier of electricity in the world, with it now being among the most expensive and hurting people and industries, while Mr Mayfield, during a cost-of-living crisis, two years ago was on a total remuneration package of more than $613,000. I’m thinking of people with a median income of $51,000, and half the Australian population is earning below $51,000.

Dr Hilton: I’m always impressed with the quality and influence of the work that our scientists do, but the capacity to directly alter the cost of living for Australians is not one of those gifts our researchers have.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you.

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Government’s Chief of Propoganda, Chris Bowen

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The government is the largest spreader of misinformation, and its Chief of Propaganda is Chris Bowen. There’s no limit to the lies he’ll tell to push the Net-Zero pipe-dream that’s making everyone’s bills higher.

Transcript

Chris Smith: Let’s get on to energy. Now, a report from the US Energy Department is saying that with nuclear electricity, prices will drop 37%. Chris Bowen says renewables will always be cheaper. This is basically a blatant lie, isn’t it, Malcolm?  

Senator ROBERTS: Well, you stole the word right out of my mouth. It is a lie. It is fraud. Fraud is the presentation of something as it is not for personal gain. Chris Bowen has been pushing this bandwagon, the lies fraudulently to get political capital. He is telling lie after lie. Solar and wind are the most expensive forms of energy, that’s repeated everywhere. You know, AEMO doesn’t even cost the lowest price system. What they did with, relying on GenCost in the first place was false assumptions underpinning their calculations for solar and wind to make them look favorable and negative assumptions under coal to make it look unaffordable. That is completely false. And now we’ve got a circular argument that’s beaten back to us all the time. AEMO doesn’t cost the lowest price systems. It’s forced to exclude the cost of calculating coal or nuclear. This is rubbish – the stuff that comes out of the south end of north bound bull.  

Chris Smith: Yeah, well, the CSIRO should be condemned completely for their reliance on that GenCost report. Malcolm.  

Senator ROBERTS: That is fraud as well Chris. That was a deliberate misrepresentation of the energy structure. It was politically driven to achieve a political objective, the same as their climate. The CSIRO has admitted to me that the politician’s quoting them as saying that there’s a danger in carbon dioxide from human activity, the CSIRO has denied ever saying that and they said they would never say it. They admitted to me that the temperatures today was not unusual, not unprecedented. So the whole thing is based on the stuff that comes out of the south end of north bound bull. The CSIRO is guilty of misrepresenting climate science, misrepresenting nature and misrepresenting climate, misrepresenting energy. It’s just a fraud to extract money, to make billionaires richer, and to make, foreign multinationals richer.  

Chris Smith: Spot on.  

Senator ROBERTS: And we pay for it.  

Chris Smith: Spot on. You’re not wrong.

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Inquiry into CSIRO’s GenCost Models & Assumptions

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The greatest lie told to Australians is that “wind and solar are the cheapest forms of energy”.

Politicians and journalists, who should know better, are using a report of models from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation’s (CSIRO) GenCost to try to justify this claim. In recent decades, CSIRO has completely destroyed its once stellar reputation for scientific research. It has now allowed its name to be used for political agendas rather than real science. The underlying assumptions and inputs used for the GenCost model must be subject to scrutiny.

I voiced these comments in support of a Senate Inquiry to do that, which Labor and the greens voted down. What are they trying to hide?

Transcript

Yesterday in question time I asked the minister representing the Minister for Climate Change and Energy Senator Wong a simple question: exactly how many wind turbines, solar panels, batteries and kilometres of transmission lines were built last month? You’d think that, as the cornerstone of the Labor Party’s policy in government, the answer would be obvious and clear and given to me straightaway. To her credit—and I have a lot of regard for Senator Wong’s capability and think she’s one of the most capable senators in parliament—she said, ‘I don’t know.’ It’s the key policy for the Labor government, and they’re flying blind. 

Here’s what I told her in the second question. ‘Minister, the government’s own figures to meet your net zero target show that over the next eight years you need to install and connect more than 40 wind turbines per month, 22,000 solar panels a day, 48 gigawatt hours of batteries and 28,000 kilometres of transmission lines. I pointed out to her that the government is building nothing like that.  

The government’s wind and solar pipedream is going to be a nightmare. We are being driven off a cliff by the energy minister, Chris Bowen— 

Senator Fawcett: Order, Senator Roberts. Remember to use the correct title.  

Senator ROBERTS: Minister Bowen. This is a gargantuan task. This has been labelled by some people as the biggest transition since the start of the Industrial Revolution. It’s fundamental because energy has primacy in our society. Labor cannot tell us the cost of this transition of dumping affordable, lowest cost, reliable, stable and secure energy independent of nature’s vagaries and transitioning to an unreliable, high cost, unstable energy that is weather dependent and not secure. This is madness. But to do it without any costing is doubly mad. 

Think about it. We are giving parasitic billionaires and major corporations from around the world—many of them from China—subsidies for installing solar and wind. Those subsidies drive up the cost of electricity, and then we ship our manufacturing to China. China wins in two ways. We have got a National Electricity Market forcing out coal with unfavourable regulations—just driving coal out by making it impossible to feed the market. But it’s not a market; it’s a so-called market that bureaucrats control. It’s a national electricity racket that was introduced by John Howard’s coalition government.  

While they’re driving out coal and subsidising solar and wind, they now admit they need to keep Eraring Power Station open. They were going to shut it. They’re now offering subsidies to the owners and operators of Eraring to keep it open, so we’re subsidising them to shut it and we’re subsidising them to open it and then we’re giving $275 relief in power prices to consumers across Australia. Why? Because the energy policy has failed.  

By the way, I need to mention that on the night of the incoming Minns government, the new energy minister said that they would have to look at the closure of Eraring. She was laying a signal there—a hint—that they’d keep it open. That’s exactly what they must do because they’re terrified. The Australian Energy Market Operator has identified severe blackouts around December this year. The No. 1 factor that has driven our standard of living for the last 170 years since the start of the industrial revolution has been relentless reduction in energy prices, the unit cost of energy. It’s been a relentless reduction in the real cost of energy. That was until John Howard’s government introduced the renewable energy target and other measures, and since then it has relentlessly increased. Australia has gone from having the cheapest coal and the cheapest electricity prices, thanks to our wonderful coal assets—high-quality, clean coal—to now having amongst the most expensive electricity. 

So let’s have a look at the terms of reference for the inquiry that Senator Colbeck has proposed. I thank Senator Colbeck for his motion. It says: 

That the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation GenCost 2023-24 report be referred to the Economics References Committee for inquiry and report … to explore assumptions and costings made in the report, including but not limited to— 

the CSIRO has been criticised for every one of these things I’m about to read out— 

a. asset lifecycles; 

b. capacity factors; 

c. energy type costings; 

d. financing costs; 

e. fuel costs; 

f. augmentation requirements of transmission systems; 

g. data standards techniques; and 

h. other related matters. 

CSIRO has been belted by experts on every one of these. We badly need this inquiry. These are the fundamentals of the biggest transition since the industrial revolution. 

CSIRO used to be a highly respected organisation. It was internationally respected. It has now come to mean ‘corrupted science is really obvious’. It lost its way distorting and omitting science to fabricate support for the UN’s climate fraud. The CSIRO has never presented the basis of science which is empirical scientific data—measurements and observations—within logical scientific points that prove cause and effect. The CSIRO has been integral in working with the UN climate change body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in pushing distortions of science. 

I have had three meetings with the CSIRO at 2½ hours each and, under cross-examination, it has admitted that it has never said that there has been any danger due to human carbon dioxide. It has admitted that, even though climate change was based initially on global warming claims, temperatures are not unprecedented. It has claimed the rate of temperature change is unprecedented, but the rate of temperature change is almost negligible since 1995. It’s almost flat. That’s according to NASA’s scientific satellite measuring temperatures. The CSIRO gave us not one solid paper to back up its claims. What it did give us was two papers we tore to shreds. Then they gave us another two, and we tore them to shreds. There are 24,000 datasets that I have access to that have been scraped from sites all over the world, including CSIRO’s and BOM’s case studies, and there is not one that shows any change in any climate factor—not one. It’s just inherent natural variation with cycles superimposed. Not only that but the CSIRO has never provided bases for policy and neither has any department or the alphabet soup of energy agencies. They have all failed to answer my question: what’s the specific effect of carbon dioxide from human activity on climate, on any aspect of climate or on any factor of climate? What is the quantified specific effect per unit of carbon dioxide from human activity? Ocean heat content, air temperatures, ocean temperatures, storm frequency, severity and duration—not one of them can give me any answers on those at all. That is the basis for policy. Without that, you cannot understand or evaluate the options for reducing human carbon dioxide, you cannot track the progress of the measures and you cannot cost the alternatives. This is flying blind over a cliff. Electricity prices in every country with significant solar and wind have increased dramatically. Labor is simply continuing the policy that John Howard started, Tony Abbott continued, Malcolm Turnbull accelerated, Scott Morrison continued and Peter Dutton now propagates by confirming net zero. 

Let’s turn specifically to the CSIRO report, GenCost. CSIRO used to be a respected scientific organisation, advancing our country’s technology. I refer to Senator Fawcett’s speech a minute ago. Now the CSIRO is a blatantly political organisation. It’s more interested in pushing the agenda of the government than in providing impartial, evidence-based research. Ideology is infecting most of CSIRO’s work like a virus. The GenCost report is shocking evidence of just how biased this once-respected institution has become. The methodology used in GenCost is so flawed that there are multiple hours of podcast series explaining all of its deficiencies, and I give a compliment Aidan Morrison for some of his work. 

Let’s start with the cost of wind and solar. Many people, including some politicians, think GenCost says what it costs for wind and solar to deliver a kilowatt of power today. It doesn’t! It fundamentally doesn’t tell us the cost. GenCost imagines some fairytale dreamtime half-a-dozen years in the future and projects what they think wind and solar will cost, with no accurate, solid assumptions underpinning that. CSIRO even admits that this prediction they come up with is not the actual cost, but this is what policy relies on. CSIRO completely excludes the cost of every single power project up until 2030. They’re free! They’re free, according to this mob. 

Just look at the tens of thousands of kilometres of transmission projects assumed to be free: EnergyConnect, $2.3 billion; Marinus Link, $3 billion. All are assumed to be free. Free, free, free! Santa Claus is giving them to us! There’s Central-West Orana, $3.2 billion, and HumeLink, $5 billion. It doesn’t sound like much when you rattle off a billion, does it! There are dozens more major projects. 

Let’s look at the pumped hydro that’s assumed to be free. There’s Snowy 2.0, $12 billion plus and counting. That’s not included. There’s the Battery of the Nation in Tasmania, our biggest island. That’s $3 billion. It’s not included. There’s the Borumba pump hydro, $14 billion. It’s not included. There’s the Pioneer-Burdekin pumped hydro, $12 billion. It’s not included. The list goes on and on and on. Tens of billions of dollars is excluded from the cost of wind and solar, but we’ll all pay for it—some people with their jobs when they’re shipped off overseas, some people for whom the cost of living will drive these out of reach. 

Almost all of these projects, especially the pump hydro, are only being planned because of wind and solar, yet CSIRO excludes them from the cost of wind and solar completely. It’s like saying a Ferrari is the cheapest car you can buy, as long as you take out the cost of the sunroof, the air conditioning, the wheels, the gearbox and the engine. 

Then there are their calculations on the cost of coal. They added an extra five per cent cost to the finance figures with no basis whatsoever. CSIRO just says, ‘Well, no-one likes coal anymore,’ and, whack, a completely unfounded hurdle is added on top. Then there’s the capacity factor. That’s the percentage of time the station is running. It has a huge impact on the calculated cost of power, if you assume a billion-dollar power station is running for only half the time it actually is on and can be on. They’re destroying the viability of coal with lies. 

CSIRO also says: 

In 2030, we project forward including all existing state renewable energy targets resulting in a 64% renewable share and 56% variable renewable share … 

They just assume that we’re going to press ahead with variable renewable energy, regardless of what happens and without any costings. They just assume it’s going to go ahead. It doesn’t sound like impartial modelling to me, because it’s not impartial modelling. 

But the people of Australia will pay for this. They will pay for it with their jobs. They will pay for it with their livelihoods. They will pay for it with their family budgets. What sensitivities have been applied for political risk? Policy will almost certainly change and you may have a government elected that ditches false targets. What percentage of chance do they give that? The United Kingdom is abandoning net zero. The Prime Minister has said so. Japan is switching back to coal. It is already using a lot of coal. Germany is scrapping wind turbines to extend coalmines. It is tearing down wind turbines that were installed so that they can mine the coal underneath them. China is producing 4½ billion tonnes of coal. We produce 560 tonnes, and we export most of that overseas, and China is buying coal from us. Indonesia is now the world’s largest exporter of coal. India has well over a billion tonnes of coal. 

This report, the GenCost report from CSIRO, isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, yet it’s being used to justify one of the largest destructions of our economy in Australia’s history. Even if you naively believe we need to run the grid on solar and wind, this GenCost report deserves scrutiny and the Australian people deserve transparency. CSIRO has repeatedly shown it is dishonest on climate and energy. We need an inquiry. In refusing or opposing, the government shows it fears its assumptions will be shown to be flawed. If I’m wrong, CSIRO would be vindicated. So CSIRO, if it had any courage, would stand up and say, ‘Bring on the inquiry.’ Thank you, Senator Colbeck. We support this motion. 

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Natural Cyclical Events Impact More Than Human Activity

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Recently, I spoke in the Senate regarding the impact of this summer’s flooding on the coral reef. Coral polyps are saltwater creatures. When floodwaters impact the reef, it introduces fresh water, cold temperatures and sediment, all of which cause coral bleaching. El Niño (ENSO cycles) causes a reduction in clouds, resulting in higher solar radiation, higher temperatures, and coral bleaching.

Both of these are cyclical and not caused by human activity. Yet the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority (GBRMPA) appear to be focusing solely on the “climate change is causing warming temperatures and coral bleaching” argument instead of presenting the broader picture.

I was reassured that the GBRMPA accepts that ENSO cycles play a role in coral bleaching. I look forward to more honesty and transparency on this issue from the BOM, CSIRO and the globalist controlled Australian Institute of Marine Science.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing tonight. Let me start with a simple question: can floodwaters entering the reef from the 28 river systems that discharge onto the reef in a rain event, such as a tropical cyclone, cause coral bleaching, either through fresh water itself, through very low floodwater temperature, or through high nutrient levels or turbidity or sediment?

Mr Thomas: There can certainly be initial freshwater bleaching from flood events.

Mr Quincey: And we did see some of that this year with the cyclones in the north.

Senator ROBERTS: It’s true that corals also bleach from water that is too cold, isn’t it? I can remember that in June 2008 that there were record cold temperatures in various parts of Queensland and the Northern Territory, including southern Queensland, and the southern Great Barrier Reef bleached because of the cold weather.

Mr Thomas: I’m not sure of that particular example. But, yes, bleaching is certainly a stress response that can be triggered by a range of different things. Most recently, though, our biggest concerns have been about warmer waters, not colder waters.

Senator ROBERTS: Was any of the coral bleaching that was evident on the reef in the first quarter of 2024 caused by freshwater and salt intrusion?

Mr Thomas: Yes, as Mr Quincey said. Probably because of flood events prior to and post Christmas in in the north, there would have been some initial freshwater bleaching. I don’t have specific details of that in front of me, though.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Was any of the coral bleaching in the first quarter caused by pesticides or other chemical run-off from farming areas?

Mr Thomas: Direct attribution of those impacts would be difficult for me to provide here today, but we could take some of that question on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Please. According to a paper from the University of Queensland, simplified: The most devastating mass coral bleaching has occurred during El Niño events … However, El Niño itself does not cause SSTs— sea surface temperatures— to rise in all regions that experience bleaching. Nor is the upper ocean warming trend of 0.11°C per decade since 1971 … sufficient alone to exceed the thermal tolerance of corals. This paper shows that a major contributing factor is El Nino reducing cloud cover, causing ‘higher than average air temperatures and higher than average atmospheric pressures’ and playing ‘a crucial role in determining the extent and location of coral bleaching’ on the reef. Is that a fair statement?

Mr Thomas: I’m not aware of that particular paper. Did you say it was the University of Queensland?

Senator ROBERTS: Yes.

Mr Thomas: I’m not aware of it. I’m sorry. But we would be very interested to read more about it.

Senator ROBERTS: We can get it to you.

Mr Thomas: Yes, please.

Senator ROBERTS: Do you accept natural, cyclical ENSO events play a crucial role in coral bleaching?

Mr Thomas: We would have to defer to climate scientists around the particular localised impacts and how they’ve played out on the Great Barrier Reef.

Senator ROBERTS: Localised impacts, not global?

Mr Thomas: For how those significant meteorological phenomena impact the Great Barrier Reef in particular, I would need to consult with other relevant experts.

Senator ROBERTS: According to the Bureau of Meteorology document ‘124 years of Australian rainfall’, there’s no trend. There’s no pattern. It’s just cyclical. There’s no trend whatsoever, down or up. It’s just natural variation, influenced by cycles. In the last five years, we’ve had three La Ninas. Your website, under the heading ‘What causes coral bleaching?’, makes the comment: The biggest cause of coral bleaching in the past 20 years has been rising water temperatures. On notice if you wish, please provide how much water temperature has increased in the last 20 years, including average and range, showing any spikes that may have occurred.

Mr Thomas: Thank you. We will take that on notice.

Senator ROBERTS: Something like that, maybe?

Mr Thomas: I’m not sure I can reproduce that exactly, but we’ll certainly take that—

Senator ROBERTS: No, I wouldn’t expect you to reproduce it.

Mr Thomas: We will certainly try to take an—

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. Have you tested those spike temperatures that may have led to bleaching against the ENSO cycle? Have you correlated them?

Mr Quincey: I couldn’t answer now, but we would most likely consult with our colleagues not only in the Bureau of Meteorology but in the CSIRO and the Australian Institute of Marine Science, who do some of that work.

Mr Thomas: We’re not the authors of some of these reports. We work with those relevant institutions. We pull that information together. We try to synthesise it and make the best assessments we can on how we can hone our programs and better manage the Great Barrier Reef into the future. With some of the specificity and science you’re referring to, we really would need to speak to some of our experts.

Senator ROBERTS: Okay. This is the last question. The bleaching impact statement on your website, which you describe as ‘a framework to describe and categorise coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef’, only includes one factor: heat stress, which you attribute to climate change, ignoring these other crucially important factors. Is this about blaming bleaching on climate change, which is well-funded, and ignoring the role of natural cycles, which carries no funding? We’ve heard the United Nations say that the planet is now boiling.

Mr Thomas: Is your question about whether our framework for understanding coral bleaching is limited to heat stress?

Senator ROBERTS: Yes, it seems that it’s only limited to heat stress.

Mr Quincey: It has it there as heat stress, but the exposure blocks the subtleties of exactly what you’re talking about—about light intensity and exposure and cloud cover. Also, on our website, we really try to convey that local and regional weather in particular places has a large bearing on the outcomes that we see each summer, and those factors play into that.

Senator ROBERTS: Thank you.

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CSIRO’s GenCost is Just a Wind and Solar Fairy-tale!

Politicians keep telling Australia that “wind and solar are the cheapest form of energy” while they force Net-Zero down our throats. As proof, they point to a CSIRO document called GenCost, which supposedly estimates the cost of different types of electricity. Yet, it doesn’t estimate the costs of electricity today.

GenCost uses a whole bunch of assumptions that are favorable to wind and solar to claim they will be the cheapest… in 2030. GenCost doesn’t even include the cost of transmission, one of the largest expenses for wind and solar. Huge transmission costs are the reason wind and solar projects are sitting stranded in the outback connected to nothing. This is the same CSIRO that seemingly knows nothing about Snowy 2.0, which has blown out from $2 billion to over $20 billion for the project and associated infrastructure. They forecast the cost of pumped hydro storage will average less than a quarter of the current estimates for Snowy, the pumped hydro that’s actually being built.

To say I don’t trust CSIRO have the right answers on the actual cost of “renewables” is an understatement. The claim that wind and solar are the cheapest is simply a lie that ignores storage, transmission and intermittency. GenCost is just a fairy tale about the future, not an impartial analysis of what wind and solar costs today.

Transcript

Senator ROBERTS: Welcome, Professor Hilton. I will put some questions on notice about carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from human production. I would like to question the expert spokesman on GenCost.

Prof. Hilton: We are delighted you are asking questions about GenCost. One of the greatest challenges facing Australia is the transition of our energy sector. I am proud of the contribution that the GenCost report makes in this area. The report has been generated annually since 2018. It has evolved over time to take account of the changing technology landscape and the availability of new data. I anticipate that the report will continue to evolve.

Senator ROBERTS: I want to get to the heart of some of the issues that I see with GenCost. What was the cost first budgeted for pumped hydro energy storage Snowy 2?

Mr Graham: I might take that on notice. I am aware of the recent update to the cost, but I don’t have the original figure on me.

Senator ROBERTS: The original figure was $2 billion. What is it currently budgeted at?

Mr Graham: It is in the order of $12 billion.

Senator ROBERTS: That’s correct. How long are the tunnels for it?

Mr Graham: I don’t have that on hand.

Senator ROBERTS: It is 27 kilometres. How much of the tunnel have they bored so far in the last year, or just over a year?

Mr Graham: I am not tracking that measurement.

Senator ROBERTS: It is 150 metres. It has been bogged for about a year. When was it initially scheduled for completion?

Mr Graham: I don’t have that on me.

Senator ROBERTS: It was 2021. What has that blown out to now?

Mr Graham: Around 2029.

Senator ROBERTS: Earlier; 2028.

Senator McAllister: Senator Roberts, the official is indicating to you that he is happy to accommodate your line of questioning. However, detailed questions about the project details for Snowy Hydro are best dealt with in the environment estimates. I know you addressed these kinds of questions to Mr Barnes, the CEO of Snowy. You might direct questions to CSIRO which they can assist with. You mentioned your interest in the GenCost report— you might get better answers about that from the official.

Senator ROBERTS: Sure. They are now estimating the cost of the transmission infrastructure—which was left out of the original package—at $10 billion for it to be connected to the grid and be useful. That now makes it up to $22 billion for 2,200 megawatts of pumped hydro energy storage, which is $10 million per megawatt, or $10,000 per kilowatt. We won’t even get into the fact that it is only forecast to put out that capacity for an average of 26 minutes a day. What is the cost per kilowatt of pumped hydro you provided in GenCost?

Mr Graham: The Snowy 2.0 project is incredibly unique. It was approximately 170 hours duration for 2 gigawatts originally, but it is higher than that now: 2.2 to 2.5.

Senator ROBERTS: It is 2.2.

Mr Graham: No other project on the books in Australia that we are looking at has that type of profile. In GenCost we report pumped hydro projects more in the order of 12 to 48 hours, that kind of duration, which is
nowhere near the 170 hours for Snowy 2.0.

Senator ROBERTS: What is your capacity?

Mr Graham: We have a table in GenCost with a series of figures on the cost of pumped hydro. I’ll get the exact data for you.

Senator McAllister: Are you asking what role Mr Graham performs—

Senator ROBERTS: No: what is the cost per kilowatt-hour of pumped hydro you have provided in GenCost?

Mr Graham: I didn’t bring that table with me. I’ll have to get back to you with that on notice. That cost isn’t related to Snowy 2.0. It is related to other projects, which are much smaller.

Senator ROBERTS: That’s what I understand. In GenCost, what would it be, roughly? I won’t hold you to it.

Mr Graham: It is of the order of $2,500 a kilowatt.

Senator ROBERTS: Snowy 2, which is a real-life project that is not even finished yet, is $10,000. GenCost is built on modelling based on assumptions projected out to the future; is that correct, broadly?

Mr Graham: That’s correct.

Senator ROBERTS: We don’t know from GenCost what it would cost to replace our coal-fired fleet with solar and wind today, and all the transmission lines and back-up storage. How useful is GenCost?

Mr Graham: We made the decision to focus GenCost on new-build generation and storage and some hydrogen technologies. There are other processes for, and reports that deal with, transmission. We don’t deal with
transmission. GenCost is designed for people to calculate the cost of building and replacing existing generation. But you can’t go to GenCost necessarily to look at issues around transmission.

Senator ROBERTS: Some of your opponents argue that GenCost is detached from reality. If we look at Snowy 2—I am not implying that you have anything to do with Snowy 2—right from the start, Minister, the
decision to build Snowy 2 was made without a cost-benefit analysis, and with a heavily redacted business case that could not be scrutinised. You have acknowledged that you are basically building models based on
assumptions and projecting them into the future. I don’t think the government has anything on what is going on right now. Is that right, Minister?

Senator McAllister: Senator Roberts, I might get the official to revisit the evidence he has just provided about the way the calculations are developed for understanding the cost of hydro because I don’t think it is as you have described.

Senator ROBERTS: Minister, we have major solar and wind installations, industrial complexes, which are not connected to the grid. This is the level of planning that is going on at state and federal. They are not connected but they have been paid for, and I think that they are earning revenue. That is the reality.

Senator McAllister: I am not aware of the particular projects you are referring to, but they are certainly not things this agency can assist you with.

Senator ROBERTS: My question to you is: something that is projected into the future based on models and assumptions now is divorced from reality, and we need to know the cost now. Why are we embarking on this
journey with so much uncertainty?

Senator McAllister: Senator Roberts, you are asking me about energy policy. We have talked about it earlier in the week. We consistently have advice from a very wide range of sources—

Senator ROBERTS: Can you name some of them?

Senator McAllister: about firmed renewables being the lowest cost form of new energy in the Australian context. When AEMO looks at what is required to replace all of thermal generation that is coming to the end of its life over the next decade, they try to model—because they need to—the transmission that will optimally connect the optimal configuration of new generation. That AEMO work is not principally led by CSIRO. CSIRO have a capacity to contribute; I think the official can speak to the ways they do. I don’t wish to frustrate your efforts to have this discussion, but it is not in this portfolio.

Senator ROBERTS: Thanks, Minister. Thank you, Chair.

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What changed to make the Coalition adopt country-killing net-zero?

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https://youtu.be/25wrsuzXz8Q

Scott Morrison won the last election by bashing Bill Shorten on his climate policies, especially a net-zero emissions commitment. After getting elected for not buying into the climate nonsense, Scott Morrison unexplainably signed us up to net zero despite CSIRO confirming there was no change in the ‘Science’™.

There’s still no proof that human produced carbon dioxide affects the climate and needs to be cut. By signing up to net-zero, Scott Morrison has given a death kiss to productive agriculture, mining and every Australians power bills with no justification..

Transcript

If you could be as quick as you could.

[Roberts] Thank you. And thank you all for attending. My questions are gonna be initially to the minister. And then if there’s time to the Chief Executive, of CSIRO. Minister, referring to the government’s change in its 2050 net zero policy in the 2019 election, the government’s opposition to the UN’s 2050 net zero carbon dioxide policy gained you many votes and a lot of political traction and you used the the policy, Labor’s adoption of the policy to really smash the opposition leader Bill Shorten. Just two years later, after emphatically repeatedly and thoroughly criticising Labor and the Greens, there was an unexplained reversal last year and the government adopted the UN’s 2015 net zero carbon dioxide policy. What is the specific change in climate science in which the government’s change of policy is based?

Oh, well, thank you. I think to answer that question in detail I think it will probably be best for the environment minister, but I would simply say that I don’t accept the premise of all of what you’ve said in terms of-

[Roberts] What do you disagree with?

Well, you said unexplained. I mean, obviously we went through quite a detailed process. The prime minister spoke on a number of occasions about his desire to get to a net zero position if it can be done in a way that protects Australian jobs and continues to see industries thrive. And that’s what Minister Taylor worked on. Now we’re not obviously in the space where we have the detail in terms of those portfolios, but it was explained over a period of time. The government made the decision. Obviously, it played out publicly where there was a conversation, I think, with the Australian people. And obviously, there was a live debate that you were aware of that the coalition went through when the government came to a conclusion.

[Roberts] Okay. It wasn’t explained in terms of some change in science. There was no references. There was no document. No publications referred to no specific page numbers of the change in the data or the cause. So there was nothing to change the policy.

Well, as I say, the government was not prepared to commit to such a policy without being able to do the work as to how we would get there and how we would do so in a responsible way. And that was the the job that Minister Taylor in particular was tasked with. And that was the the work that fed into the government decision. Now, in terms of the detail, the various portfolio parts of that, I think that’s probably for another part of estimates.

[Roberts] Okay.

I think that summarises the government’s position.

[Roberts] Well, let’s go back a step further. What’s the basis of the government’s climate policy and ensuring policies on consequent policies on energy, agriculture, manufacturing, social policy and other aspects that the UN’s climate and associated policies impact? What’s the overall basis?

Sorry. I might just get you to repeat that question, sorry.

[Roberts] What is the basis of the government’s climate policy and the consequent policies that stumble on from that on energy agriculture, manufacturing, social policy and other aspects that the UN’s climate and associated policies impact?

Well, look, it’s a fairly broad question.

[Roberts] It is.

I might ask officials if they can assist.

[Man] There are appearing in my data.

Yeah. [Joe Evans] Miss Evans.

Very quickly, Joe Evans, the deputy secretary in the department and Senator, the basis is really the globally agreed science on climate change, which is articulated through the International Panel on Climate Change reports

[Roberts] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change?

That’s the one. Yeah.

[Roberts] Okay. Thank you. That was nice and quick. Back to the minister. Cutting human carbon dioxide output has had huge costly impacts across our society, especially on fundamentals for productivity and prosperity, for example, energy. Surely the only sound basis for a policy with such economic consequences is the specific effect of changing human carbon dioxide output. The impact for example of a specified change in human output of carbon dioxide, what specific impact would it have on climate factors such as temperature, rainfall, droughts, wind? So the specific impact. Then when the effect is quantified, only then can we do a cost benefit analysis of the cost of doing that and the benefits that come from that. And significantly, we can’t do any measurement of progress as we implement the policy unless we’ve got that specific impact of carbon dioxide. What is that specific impact of carbon dioxide on various climate factors?

Well, I’m happy for officials to elaborate, but I mean, in terms of what the government’s approach has been, it has been to be part of The Paris Agreement. So part of collective action across the world where we are doing our part, and we’ve been doing that obviously with our emissions reductions to date, which have been tracking, in fact, ahead of many comparable OECD nations and many sort of comparable resource-rich nations, such as Canada.

[Roberts] So what would be the extra impact of tracking?

But if I can also go to your question, and in the preamble to your question around, you talked about other economic impacts or impacts in relation to higher energy prices and the like. What we’ve seen under our government in the last few years is actually energy prices coming down year on year and coming down quarter on quarter. So we as a government never look at these issues in isolation. We look at it as part of that collective response and taking our responsibilities to the environment seriously, but never taking our eye off the ball, in terms of the need for affordable and reliable energy for instance. And that’s something that we’ve been delivering and that’s been our track record.

Senator Roberts, we got to go to the office of the chief scientist at 6:25. So I know you did want to ask some questions to the Chief Executive Officer, of CSIRO. So I just wanted to give you that chance.

[Roberts] Thank you. So essentially what you’re saying, Senator Seselja, is that your answer is the same as the one Senator Cormann gave me repeatedly when I asked questions in the Senate and wrote him letters? That was, we’ve got to do our part of global agreements.

I’m not aware of exactly what former Minister Cormann-

[Roberts] That’s the gist.

Well, as I say, I’ll take you take your word for that.

[Roberts] I can show you his letters.

Sure. I’m not disputing. All I’m saying is I’m not aware of exactly what Minister Cormann told you, but my evidence is the evidence I’ve just given.

[Roberts] Assuming what I’ve said to you of Senator Cormann’s responses, you’re agreeing with it.

Well, look, it’s a difficult question to answer without seeing all the detail of what you’ve said but I think my evidence speaks for itself.

[Roberts] Okay. Bob Hawke’s Labor government first introduced the climate topic in the eighties. Then in 1996, the Howard Anderson Liberal-National’s government first made it policy. On what specific quantified effect did they base that policy? Do you know?

Well, look, I think you’re talking about history of before I was in this place. And so I would prefer without having been involved in those discussions, I don’t feel qualified to give a detail answer on that.

[Roberts] No, I understand. It’s okay. Are you aware that the Howard-Anderson Liberal-National’s government implemented their renewable energy target that is gutting electricity and industry, generally? That they stole farmer’s property rights to use their land. And they did that deceitfully going around the constitution, section 51, clause 31. And that John Howard was the first leader of a large party to adopt an emissions trading scheme, which Tony Abbott rightly called a carbon dioxide tax. Are you aware of those major policies that are now still in play? And John Howard actually said that the renewable energy target has gone too far now?

Well, I certainly wouldn’t accept your characterisation of some of those policies in the way you’ve framed them, and certainly in relation to those fine leaders of our nation that you’ve sort of characterised their policies in a certain way. So no, I wouldn’t agree with that.

[Roberts] Okay. Thank you.

Sorry. Senator Roberts, I’m sorry-

[Roberts] I just got one thing to follow up.

Well, it’s gotta be very quick.

[Roberts] It will be very quick. Are you aware that six years after being booted from office in 2007, in 2013, John Howard admitted, at a global warming sceptics annual address in London, that on climate science he was agnostic yet he introduced these policies?

No, I wasn’t aware of that, but I am aware-

[Roberts] Thank you very much, chair.

Thank you, Senator.

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No one has the evidence – Climate Urgency

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Father of the Senate Ian Macdonald said there has never been a debate on climate science, and he’s correct.

Transcript

Contradictions erupt and abound in climate and energy policies, because no politician has ever provided the logical scientific points as evidence.

John Howard’s government introduced the Renewable Energy Target and stole farmers’ property rights to use their property. Yet, six years after being booted from office, he confessed in London in 2013 that on climate science he was agnostic. He had no science to support what has become the gutting of our electricity sector and our productive capacity.

In 2016, father of the Senate Ian Macdonald said there has never been a debate on climate science, and he’s correct. Two months ago 10 federal politicians confirmed in writing to me that they have never been provided with the scientific evidence. I’ll name those people; they showed integrity and courage. In August last year, 19 federal politicians advocating climate alarm and climate policies failed to provide me with the scientific evidence. I’ll name them too.

In 2007 and 2008, Kevin Rudd claimed that 4,000 scientists supported the claim that carbon dioxide from human activity affects climate and needs to be cut. The UN climate body’s own data shows that only five endorsed the claim, and there’s doubt they were even scientists. Mathias Cormann, instead of providing evidence as requested many times, says, ‘We must meet global obligations’—to the same organisations that Prime Minister Morrison rightly describes as ‘unelected international bureaucrats’.

My own freedom of information requests and Parliamentary Library searches show that no evidence has ever been given to members of parliament—Senate and House of Representatives—that would require these policies. Yet both the Labor-Greens coalition and the Liberal-Nationals coalition have climate and energy policies that are not based on empirical scientific evidence. Come clean with the people of Australia. Unshackle our nation! Give the people a go. Restore freedom.

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