Victorian Energy Minister accused of mistruths over gas job losses

Representatives of Australia’s largest gas appliance manufacturers have accused Lily D’Ambrosio of ‘lying’, after the Victorian Energy Minister claimed they had not produced any ‘evidence’ that hundreds of jobs will be lost.

Energy Minister Lily D'Ambrosio arrives at Parliament House in Melbourne. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Representatives of Australia’s largest gas appliance manufacturers have accused Lily D’Ambrosio of “lying”, after the Victorian Energy Minister claimed they had not produced any “evidence” that hundreds of jobs will be lost as a result of the Allan government’s gas substitution road map.

The Australian this week reported Gas Appliance Manufacturers Association of Australia claims that the government’s plans, which include outlawing gas connections to new homes from January 1, will destroy more than 1300 jobs in six to 12 months.

On Wednesday, Ms D’Ambrosio said: “They (the gas industry) say that. I haven’t seen the evidence on that.”

Asked whether she would wait for businesses to close before she accepted jobs would be lost, Ms D’Ambrosio said: “No. What I’m saying to you is that I’m waiting for the evidence on it, and I’ve asked them for the evidence.”

Nicholas Smith, general manager of Illusion Australia Gas Log Fires, Australia’s largest manufacturer of gas heating appliances, said he had written to Ms D’Ambrosio’s office repeatedly since the gas connections ban was announced on July 28, even sending her communications manager a copy in August of the redundancy notice he had been forced to issue to 45 staff in the its manufacturing division, AG Building Developments, in Dandenong, in Melbourne’s outer southeast.

“For her to say they haven’t had evidence is the greatest lie,” Mr Smith said.

Letter from Illusion Log Fires’ manufacturing division A.G. Building Developments, notifying 45 staff that they would be made redundant as of September 1.

He said the only response he had received was a phone call from an unidentified number and a message asking him to contact the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action, but provided no contact details.

“The message stated that they would like to discuss ways of retraining our staff. They didn’t want to talk about the fact that they’re essentially shutting our business down,” Mr Smith said.

Gas Appliance Manufacturers Association of Australia president Ross Jamieson said the figure of 1300 job losses in six to 12 months was derived from a survey of his members.

“They’ve all come back on a confidential basis and told me a) the loss of market and turnover, and b) the corresponding job losses,” he said.

“You can’t expect an industry to continue to employ thousands of people when the market has been destroyed. The minister has not asked us for the evidence of the jobs losses, but we’ve provided her with considerable evidence of the job losses to date.”

Illusion Gas Log Fires General Manager Nicholas Smith on the factory floor in Dandenong with staff Kanishka, Hashan, Ray, Sohrab, Asanka and Isuru. Picture: Alex Coppel.

Jon Seeley, managing director of Seeley International, Australia’s largest gas appliance manufacturer, said his business had seen a reduction in demand for gas heaters as a direct result of the Allan government’s policy, “leaving us with no choice but to scale back our operations, with the loss of 40 jobs, around 8 per cent of our workforce”.

“This has already happened. We have been very clear in expressing our concerns to the government, and any suggestion that there is no evidence of job losses is a wilful lie,” Mr Seeley said.

“We said publicly when the Victorian government announced its plan to deny future gas connections that this would result in exporting Australian manufacturing jobs to China.

“This policy distorts consumer demand away from our products manufactured here in Australia in favour of reverse-cycle airconditioning, most of which is made in China.”