Peta Credlin: Victorians have Stockholm Syndrome for control freak Dan

As hostages in a party-state we need to wake up to the Andrews government’s ideological idiocy and sheer intellectual dishonesty.

Don’t get too attached to your trusty gas appliances: your cooktop, gas hot water system, or gas heating because, if Labor has its way, these will soon be banned as part of the crusade against climate change.

On Friday, all new residential gas connections in Victoria were banned from the beginning of next year.

And because Daniel Andrews’ Victoria is the template for Labor governments right around the country, similar action can be expected everywhere.

Indeed, a few hours later, the NSW Labor Premier refused to rule it out when pushed by the media, even though banning gas appliances will only further drive-up costs to householders.

Daniel Andrews has banned all new residential gas connections in Victoria from the beginning of next year.

Plus, at least in the short term, also drive-up emissions because gas has roughly half the emissions of the coal that still provides about 70 per cent of our electricity.

This is just the latest instalment in the energy insanity gripping the country.

In making this absurd announcement, the Victorian government claimed that $1000 would be shaved from household energy bills each year. But this is even less believable than the Albanese government’s fantasy pre-election promise to cut power bills by $275 per household per year, which was at least accompanied by spurious modelling.

If an all-electric household really is going to cut costs by $1000 a year, why did the government need to make it mandatory, given that rational householders would do it anyway? In fact, the consumer organisation Choice puts the annualised cost of instant gas hot water at up to $400, compared to at least $650 for instant electric hot water.

The gas announcement is just the latest instalment in the energy insanity gripping the country. Picture: iStock

What’s more, says Choice, gas-boosted solar hot water is roughly half the annualised cost, AND half the emissions, of electric-boosted solar hot water.

So what the hell is Labor on about?

Anything that has to be forced on consumers, rather than chosen on the basis of price and quality, is never cheaper.

In this case, all that really concerns the Andrews government is emissions, not price.

Yet not only is Labor’s crusade against emissions ideologically driven, it’s also counter-productive.

Because Labor seems to have forgotten that gas has half the emissions of the coal fired power that still provides most of Victoria’s electricity, and at least in the short term, fewer gas appliances and more electric appliances will send emissions up, not down.

Labor’s crusade against emissions is ideologically driven.

And yes, if the electricity supply does eventually become 80 or 90 per cent renewable, as the government wants, emissions might ultimately decline.

But reliability will decline too, given that there is currently no technically feasible and economically viable means of firming renewable (intermittent) power, other than the gas that the Victorian government is so intent of demonising.

Just imagine only being able to have a hot shower on a windy day when the turbines are turning; or only being able to cook during daylight hours when the solar power is on, and not at night when they’re off?

That’s how crazy this is getting.

The MD of Seeley International, Australia’s largest airconditioning and gas heating appliance manufacturer with brands like Breezair and Braemar, said on Friday that “the Victorian government’s foolish and shortsighted ban on gas … will only push emissions higher and increase the risk of blackouts.”

Jon Seeley demanded that the government “stop being dishonest with Victorians … (and) stop denying the simple science that right now, in Victorian homes, electricity from brown coal is four times more emissions intensive than natural gas”.

Seeley said that the government was using “the cover of a righteous environmental pursuit ….to spread mistruths and lies” and that the government’s claim that the gas sector represents 17 per cent of Victoria’s emissions “ignored the fact that residential gas (the focus of this ban) represents less than two per cent of emissions”.

These days, it’s a rare business chief that dares to speak out against the emissions obsession, so Seeley’s denunciation testifies to the general alarm about this extraordinary measure.

Words can hardly do justice to the control freakery, the ideological idiocy, and the sheer intellectual dishonesty of the Daniel Andrews government.

It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that most of the population of Victoria is suffering from a form of Stockholm Syndrome, as hostages in a party-state under a boss who’s got the whole place in his pocket.

But unless people wake up to the folly of running a power system to reduce emissions rather than deliver affordable and reliable energy, this madness will soon spread across the entire country as hinted by Premier Chris Minns.