SA voters rejected failed energy policy, Cormann says

Mathias Cormann says the SA election result was a rejection of Jay Weatherill’s 75 per cent renewable energy pledge.

Former SA Premier Jay Weatherill. Picture: Tait Schmaal.

Finance Minister Mathias Cormann says South Australians voted with their feet against a “failed approach” to energy policy when they ended Labor leader Jay Weatherill’s term as premier on Saturday.

Senator Cormann said Saturday’s poll had been a good day for Liberal Premier-elect Stephen Marshall, and a rejection of Mr Weatherill’s pledge to deliver 75 per cent renewable energy by 2025.

The Liberal win in South Australia coincided with a Labor victory over the Greens in the inner Melbourne federal seat of Batman.

“The people in South Australia strongly endorsed the plan that (Mr Marshall) took to the election, and indeed they voted with their feet for lower electricity prices, reliable energy, and of course for our joint approach to energy policy,” Senator Cormann told ABC radio.

He said he was hopeful all states and territories would now sign up to the Turnbull government’s National Energy Guarantee, which Mr Weatherill had refused to be part of.

“We hope they will, because we want to deliver lower electricity prices, more reliable energy supplies, and we want to do so mindful of our commitments to reducing emissions that we’ve signed onto in Paris, so it was disappointing that under the previous administration the South Australian state government did not come on board, but obviously now there’ll be a new opportunity here,” Senator Cormann said.

“We’re looking forward to working with the Marshall government, making sure that people across the national electricity market will be able to benefit from lower electricity prices, and more stable, more reliable energy supplies.”

Mr Weatherill had criticised the NEG for not having a sufficiently ambitious emissions reduction target.

A report out today by energy analyst RepuTex found state governments, particularly Queensland and Victoria, were already driving sufficient investment in solar and wind power to cut the electricity sector’s emissions by more than NEG target.

Asked whether the NEG target should go further, or risk being seen as redundant, Senator Cormann said energy policy had been one of the big failures of the Weatherill government.

“The people of South Australia voted with their feet. They voted against the failed approach when it comes to energy policy,” he said.

“Within the National Energy Guarantee we’re very ambitious about bringing down the price of electricity by making sure that there are reliable energy supplies that will keep the lights on. “Jay Weatherill actually ended up with his state, his entire state with a blackout, energy blackout, and he was not able to keep the lights on, and of course he’s pursued his excessive and ideologically driven pursuit of excessive renewable energy targets without, for example, focusing on the need for storage and without focusing on the need to deal with the challenges that come with intermittent energy supplies.

“That’s the results that are there for all to see. Now as far as we’re concerned new technology must be able to deliver reliable, affordable energy supplies and we want to do so in a way that helps us meet our emissions reduction targets.”

Minor parties articulating grievance without offering solution: Abbott

Former PM Tony Abbott. Picture: AAP Image/Mick Tsikas

Former prime minister Tony Abbott said the South Australian election and the Batman by-election showed people were “waking up” to the minor parties.

“Minor parties are articulating a grievance than they are at offering a solution, and as Chris Kenny said in The Australian today, as soon as you say to a minor party person, ‘well what would you do?’, then there’s a whole lot of embarrassed shuffling and umming and ahring, because they only thrive by criticising others. They don’t thrive by coming forward with their own solutions,” Mr Abbott told 2GB.

“Yes, it’s great that the Greens lost in Batman, yes it’s good that a stale and tired Labor government with the ‘It’s Time’ factor running against it has lost in South Australia.

“I think Stephen Marshall will be a solid, steady premier, but in the end what we still need is strong and stable government in this country and at the federal level as I keep saying, that means scaling back immigration until infrastructure, housing stocks and integration have caught up, it means no more subsidised renewables, and the difficulty at the moment is that there is not a sharp enough distinction between the federal government and the federal opposition when it comes to exactly what we would do about power supplies, particularly the need for building new, highly efficient coal-fired power stations in this country, because if it’s good enough to export our coal, surely it’s good enough to use it here.”

Mr Abbott said Australia needed to rely on coal for decades to come.

“I’m all in favour of doing the right thing by the planet. We’ve only got one. We’ve got to give it to our kids in good shape,” he said.

“But we’ve got to face the fact that nothing Australia does in terms of our emissions reduction is going to make a substantial global difference.

“America has pulled out of the Paris accords, Paris imposed very little if any restriction on the emissions growth of countries like China and India, so my point all along has been yes, let’s try to get emissions down, but let’s not do it in ways which cost jobs and damage industries, and if we don’t have affordable, reliable power, and our power in this country is much less affordable and much less reliable than it’s been for decades, if we don’t have affordable and reliable power in this country, it’s very hard for manufacturing industry to survive, let alone to flourish.”

‘I have Greens’ support to remain leader’: Richard Di Natale

Greens leader Richard Di Natale and deputy leader Adam Bandt. Picture: AAP Image/Ellen Smith

Greens leader Richard Di Natale says he has the support of his colleagues to remain leader, despite the party’s loss in their “unlosable” contest against Labor in the federal by-election for the inner Melbourne seat of Batman.

The Greens also performed poorly in Saturday’s South Australian state election, as well as in the Tasmanian election a fortnight ago.

Asked whether he had the support of his colleagues to remain leader, and when he had last checked with them, Senator Di Natale said: “Yes, I do.”

“We check in almost daily. That’s the nature of the work that we do,” Senator Di Natale told ABC radio.

“We had a result that didn’t go our way, but let’s not forget, only a few months ago we had an incredible victory in Northcote, in an area that covers part of Batman, where we saw the first Aboriginal woman elected to the Victorian parliament.

“We saw a big result in Queensland where we had a swing to us. We had our first ever lower house member of the Queensland parliament.

“I notice you didn’t mention WA either, where we saw a doubling of our representation in the WA parliament.

“There’s no question, the result on the weekend was not the result we wanted. In South Australia we’ve re-elected our sitting MP. That was always the goal.”

Senator Di Natale denied that minor parties were losing ground, given the poor performance of the Nick Xenophon Team, One Nation, Australian Conservatives and Jacqui Lambie Network in recent polls.

“No I don’t, and it’s very easy to try and draw a few threads together and to come up with a theory that doesn’t bear resemblance with the facts,” he said.

“I take the long term view about these issues. You only need to look at what’s happened to the major party vote over the last three decades. There’ll be bumps along the way, peaks and troughs, but the trend is in one way and it’s down.

“The major party vote is declining, has been declining for a long time. The proportion of the minor party vote has been increasing over the last three decades.

“Now to try and say on the basis of a couple of elections that that trend has reversed, I think is premature.

“There still is a lot of disillusionment with the old parties. People are sick of the Liberal and Labor Parties and they are looking for answers. Now it’s up to us to make sure we present that genuine alternative view for the country, and that’s what we’re committed to doing.”

Senator Di Natale said he did not need to resign over the Batman loss, blaming infighting and leaks for the party’s loss.

“What we saw during that campaign was unfortunately just a small number of people — it only takes a handful of people to undermine a campaign in the way that we saw in Batman, and what we saw there was a few people who had a personal grievance who put that grievance ahead of the interests of the party and everything it was fighting for,” he said.

Asked whether he took responsibility for the internal culture of his party, Senator Di Natale said he did.

“As leader of the party you always need to take responsibility for what happens and you also need to take responsibility for fixing it,” Senator Di Natale said.

He said the party would conduct a review into the leaking.

“Those people that are found to be responsible for leaking and undermining our candidate need to be expelled. I don’t think there’s any other alternative there and we need to ensure that that’s what happens,” he said.