QandA: China ‘will get out of Australian products’, says Mike Cannon-Brookes

Where Australia’s priorities should lie when it comes to recovery and growth post-pandemic was the topic of discussion on ABC’s QandA on Monday.

Atlassian co-founder and co-chief executive Mike Cannon-Brookes on Monday's QandA.

Where Australia’s priorities should lie when it comes to recovery and growth post-pandemic was the topic of discussion on the ABC’s QandA program on Monday night.

Investigative journalist and author Marian Wilkinson said she believed it was in China’s best interest to shift to a clean-energy economy, which will mean it will prioritise domestic supply and rely less on Australia’s exports.

Co-founder and co-chief executive of software firm Atlassian Mike Cannon-Brookes, said China will not only stop importing coal and gas within the next 20 years, but “they will get out of Australian products even faster”.

“It’s not purely around the climate change angle for them – it is about putting their economy in the best position,” Mr Cannon-Brookes said.

“They’re a long-term thinking nation and very cleverly have controlled a lot of the technologies in the renewable era that we’re entering into, from panels to batteries to electric vehicles, they control and are the major producer of those technologies.”

Despite the “rocky” state of Australia and China’s relationship, Veterans Affairs and Defence Personnel Minister Darren Chester said trade is “highly likely to continue”.

“China is still building more coal-fired power stations today and will still require Australian coal for the foreseeable future, and it’s a major export winner for Australia and importing countries as well,” Mr Chester said.

However, Mr Cannon-Brookes said the number of planned coal-fired power plants versus the number that are actually built has started to shrink and will continue to do so.

“The world is generating less energy from coal in 2020 than 2019, for the first time ever. It will continue to go down from here, including China,” he said.

Next, Mr Chester said it would be unfair to set a carbon dioxide reduction target for 2050 without knowing how Australia would reach it or fund it.

“It would be unfair to set a target for 2050 without saying how we would do it or pay for it,” he said.

“We’re trying to deliver affordable, reliable energy, and doing our part on emissions reduction, but recognising it’s a global response.”

Ms Wilkinson said Australia will be expected to start doubling down on emissions reduction, arguing that the rest of the world will not let the nation get away with not setting targets.

“We’re now in the position where you have the two most senior politicians talking about energy in this country in 2020 and never uttering the words ‘climate change’ in their major speeches,” she said.

“I think we really do have to bring this back to reality, which is, the world has signed up to the Paris agreement. If we are going to get there, Australia will be expected to play its part.”

Mr Cannon-Brookes said not having a target or legislated steps towards the target “means we don’t have the certainty to get the investment”.

“If we had legislated targets and for each 10-year period or five-year period, we’d have so much more certainty for investment,” he said.

Ms Wilkinson said that offshore wind projects, like the Star of the South off the south coast of Gippsland, have faced roadblocks for the last 20 years.

“There is a feeling that we can’t move too fast on this,” she said.

“There are quite a number of people in the coalition still – certainly in the Labor Party, but also in business and in think-tanks – who have been trying to block any substantial climate policy in this country for those 20 years.

“I think it’s still going on and I think the very fact that the renewable energy industry has got as far as it has is partly to do with the renewable energy target, but also the fact that people are investing, the world is moving on.”

Labor climate change and energy spokesman Mark Butler said the shift to cleaner energy was a race for jobs and investment around the world and that Australia should be leading the race.

“We have the best renewable energy resources in the world. The best solar. We have fantastic scientists who’ve consistently led in innovation in solar,” he said.

“We just don’t have an energy policy and a target in the middle of the century to guide that investment.”

Mr Cannon-Brookes argued Australia had the potential to be a “complete superpower of energy generation” for decades to come but said the conversation needed to be elevated.

“How do we get our economy into that spot? That’s the question we should be asking and looking at,” he said.

“And how do we use that recovery period – I agree with Mark [Butler], those jobs need to occur in the next year, two years, three years, not 20 years from now when we develop a gas base that may or may not occur.

“It’s not going to help us bring down power prices or recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.”

He continued by saying that it was the single largest potential job creation for the country.

“It’s a chance to change the structure of our economy, reduce power prices, cost of manufacturing, and generate millions of new jobs in this area that we have incredible talent and resources, financial talent, engineering, talent, electrical talent,” Mr Cannon-Brookes said.

“It’s very frustrating to me that we can’t put all this opportunity together into a real push into the future of the economy.”