David Littleproud lashes Queensland colleagues for backing Labor’s emission reduction targets

Nationals leader David Littleproud has lashed his Queensland colleagues for backing Labor’s emission reduction targets, warning that they were unachievable and ‘reckless’.

Federal Nationals leader David Littleproud. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Nationals leader David Littleproud has lashed his Queensland colleagues for backing Labor’s emission reduction targets, warning that they were unachievable and “reckless”.

In a move that has stoked further division between the state and federal arms of the party, the Queensland Liberal National Party on Thursday voted in support of the Miles government’s plan to cut 75 per cent of greenhouse gas emissions on 2005 levels by 2035.

Mr Littleproud said the federal Nationals could not support the target because it was rushed, would create “a significant disruption to existing industries in the transition” and would undermine security of the state’s manufacturing sector. “(The target) is reckless, we’ve got (until) 2050 to achieve a transition in our energy grid,” he told The Australian.

“We can do that in an orderly way, without impacting existing industries, transitioning them to nuclear where we’ve got existing coal-fired power stations, and then firming with existing gas.”

Federal Liberal MP Garth Hamilton, whose electorate of Groom covers Toowoomba, said he had already had calls from the LNP membership base warning the state team’s support of the targets was a “significant step away” from the party’s position.

“Targets without a clear pathway is a very dangerous way for a party to proceed,” he said.

“This is targets first and a plan maybe later.”

Queensland Opposition Leader David Crisafulli. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Tertius Pickard

Under the federal Coalition’s net-zero energy plan, to be released before the May budget, decommissioned coal-fired power plants would be repurposed as nuclear power stations.

State LNP leader David Crisafulli has repeatedly refused to back nuclear power, saying the plan would never get off the ground without bipartisan support at a federal level.

A spokeswoman for Mr Crisafulli said the state LNP did not support the federal Coalition’s push for nuclear energy and believed emission reduction targets could be achieved without it. “The state has exceeded the first target eight years early,” she said.

The Miles government is reliant on the proposed Pioneer-Burdekin Pumped Hydro project to reach its renewable energy and emission targets, but the project is still being subjected to financial, engineering and environmental investi­gations and is yet to get government approvals or substantive funding.

The project, slated to be built near Mackay, will cost at least $12bn and requires significant commonwealth funding.

Mr Littleproud said if elected, the Coalition would not fund Pioneer-Burdekin. “We will be giving investment signals that these renewable projects aren’t the ones that we will support,” he said. “We will be pushing ahead with our plan to get away from an all renewables approach … ultimately, the federal government … will have to pay for most of this. So unless David Crisafulli is prepared to pay for much of what he’s signing up for, then obviously that’s a matter for him.”