Somebody must foot the bill for gas exploration

It’s always bemusing when some letter writers, and even Anthony Albanese, state that the gas in Australia belongs to all Australians when in fact it does not. While in the ground, it belongs to the people of the state in which it is located.

As for teaching energy companies such as Shell and Woodside a thing or two, most of these letter writers are based in Victoria where their government demands other states send them gas at discounted prices because their own government refuses to open up known gas resource areas for development. The ones who will learn a thing or two will be the Prime Minister and Energy Minister Chris Bowen.

Those who are currently rejoicing their actions to force gas companies to sell gas at less than market prices won’t be rejoicing in the future when gas companies run by rational people decide to move elsewhere because they cannot get an acceptable economic return on their high-risk investments. Under the current plan, everyone better get ready for less gas supply into the market rather than increased supply.

Brian Barker, Bulimba, Qld

Gas and coal resources belong to the Australian people. Companies are given a licence to mine and extract those products. That does not give them a right to sell to the highest bidder on the export market and in the process drive the domestic retail price to the same level. Ninety per cent of all gas and coal is being exported at insanely high prices. LNG is extracted for about $5 and was once a domestic retail of $9. Currently that price is $35, an amount that clearly is profit grabbing.

The ongoing impact is on electricity prices for all consumers. To do nothing is culpable, so federal Labor has rightly said that these prices must be cut down. Poor Little Rich People with shares in these resources companies will take a hit on their dividends. Maybe a few will cash in, but the majority will stay because they are still making a very good return on their investment.

Chris Burden, Encounter Bay, SA

Ross Hudson (Letters, 15/12) seems confident that the Albanese government will deliver a “fair price” for Australian gas and lashes Woodside and Shell for not coming to the party. As the Soviet Union discovered, price controls without waste or shortages work only when all the demand factors align perfectly with all the supply factors. To think that economic planners can achieve that is the essence of cloud cuckoo land.

Dispiritingly for our economy, Anthony Albanese, Jim Chalmers and Chris Bowen will discover too late why planners were given the heave-ho in the Soviet Union.

Bob Miller, Wembley, WA

Hugh Morison (Letters, 15/12) worries that the federal Greens’ support for low-income homes, including renters, to switch from gas to electricity will not be a positive for our greenhouse emissions because our electricity is still mainly generated from fossil fuels.

But, just as the past is a foreign country, things are different in the future.

Around Australia, there are 93 major renewable energy projects and 34 battery projects that are under construction or will start soon. The capital investment involved is more than $26.8bn. It looks as if, finally, Australia is starting its clean energy transition.

Jennifer Griffiths, Daglish, WA

To those letter writers who insist this is “our” gas, please consider that we cannot use our gas unless someone is prepared to use their own money to explore, map, drill, transport and do all that is necessary to make it available and they then profit from the services rendered. If you refuse to pay the baker an adequate recompense for his trouble because the wheat was grown in “our” land, you will soon be going hungry. The way this government is comporting itself is very like a socialist/communist state, and we know the historical outcomes are not good.

Sharon Schwartz, Reservoir, Vic

Both Henry Ergas and Dimitri Burshtein (15/12) express concern about the government’s attempt to put a cap on gas prices. Ergas sees it as a “power grab by stealth” and quotes the psalmist warning “put not your trust in princes”, while Burshtein sees it as running “private enterprise by proxy” and finishes with a joke from the Soviet Union. However, it was Theodore Roosevelt who said, “In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.”

Ray Peck, Hawthorn, Vic