‘Grubby assertions’: Senators clash over the future of Tomago smelter
Industry Minister Tim Ayres has lashed the Coalition over “grubby assertions” about the future of Australia’s biggest single energy user.
Industry Minister Tim Ayres has lashed the Coalition over “grubby assertions” about the future of the Tomago smelter in a fiery exchange during Senate estimates.
Senator Ayres was grilled on Thursday about the future of the NSW Hunter region smelter amid warnings from owner Rio Tinto that it may be forced to close when its current coal-fired power contract with AGL expires at the end of 2028 because of rising electricity costs.
Addressing the hearing, Senator Ayres said the challenge faced by Tomago, the country’s largest single user of electricity, was not the renewable energy rollout, “it’s that it hasn’t happened as fast over the course of the last 15 years as necessary”.
Senator Ayres said “coal is too expensive” and lashed Nationals Senator Matt Canavan over multiple interjections.
“In here, you don’t interrupt me,” Senator Ayres said.
“What Rio (Tinto) – who are not a bunch of hippies – have made very clear is that coal-fired power is too unreliable and too expensive to sustain that facility.
“No matter how much you posture about this, that is the reality.
“Every time you go and stand in front of some new wind development and say that it shouldn’t happen, you are killing blue collar jobs
“Every time you campaign against solar or transmission, you are killing blue collar jobs.”
Senator Canavan challenged the Industry Minister to admit “are the jobs at Tomago at risk or not”.
“You won’t say will you? Because you don’t have the guts?” Senator Canavan said.
“You don’t have the guts to actually admit the risks those workers face.”
In response, Senator Ayres accused Senator Canavan of making “grubby assertions” and said the government had its “sleeves rolled up, working to secure the future”.
He said the federal and NSW governments were in constant “bilateral and trilateral” talks with Rio Tinto about the future Tomago.
He said the federal and NSW governments were in constant “bilateral and trilateral” talks with Rio Tinto about the future of Tomago.
Under questions from Senator Jane Hume, Senator Ayres would not say whether Snowy Hydro might be used to underwrite the energy supply.
“I am, you know, a chatty kind of character most of the time, but I’m reluctant to divulge the nature of commercial sensitive and sensitive, for all sorts of other reasons, engagements between us and NSW.”
Senatior Ayres also went on to accused the Coalition of “net zero fetishism”.
‘Bullying’ allegations rock gov department
Housing Australia executives have been grilled on bullying allegations within the embattled agency, after a Liberal senator questioned its 25 per cent turnover rate.
In October, the agency’s chairwoman Carol Austin resigned after less than three years into her term following an investigation into claims she had intimidated staff and intervened in operational matters.
Ms Austin has denied the allegations.
Speaking during budget estimates, Senator Andrew Bragg asked the panel whether there were any active workers’ compensation claims after highlighting the agency’s “very high” turnover rate.
An official confirmed the agency had four active compensation claims, but that none of those claims named members of the senior executive or board, to their knowledge.
None of the active claims related to bullying, they said.
Earlier, Housing Australia Acting Chair Damian Tangey could not identify a “particular” cultural issue in the agency.
He attributed the high turnover to “growing pains” in the wake of the agency’s expansion.
‘Diversion’: 5pc scheme grilling
Later, Senator Bragg interrogated the agency over a marginal discrepancy on the impact of Labor’s five per cent deposit scheme on house prices.
In spruiking the scheme, the Prime Minister had cited Treasury modelling as showing a 0.5 per cent increase in prices, Mr Bragg said, while the figure was actually 0.6 per cent over six years.
“So, 0.6 per cent over six years (is) vanishingly small. I don’t know what was in the Prime Minister’s mind,” Industry Minister Tim Ayres, acting for the Treasurer, said.
“It might have been 0.5 per cent over five years,” he added, before claiming the mistake was “well and truly short of the attribution errors” the Liberal senator made earlier that morning.
A back-and-forth ensued, before Senator Bragg gibed: “Nice diversion”.
Two Aus states will confidently hit housing target: Treasury
Currently, less than half of all Australian states have the Treasury’s confidence in hitting Labor’s ambitious housing target.
The government’s National Housing Accord has set a goal of building 1.2 million new, well‑located homes by July 2029.
When asked of the treasury department’s confidence of the states and territories meeting the target, an official said: “That’s a question that again, I would suggest you put to housing groups.”
“My recollection is that there are, I think, two of the states and territories that we feel more confident will meet their housing commitments based on current projections, but 2029 is still a number of years away,” the official said.
Earlier this week, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed the government was approximately 70,000 homes behind its target.
$2.3b energy rebate error an ‘oversight’
Labor’s $2.3 billion energy bill subsidy to households and businesses may have breached the Constitution due to an “inadvertent error”, the Treasury has revealed.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers announced the cost-of-living relief, which was an extension of the previous year’s $300 rebate, in March.
However, the department disclosed in its 2024-25 annual report the payments had been authorised without Mr Chalmers’ written approval.
“The potential breach of section 83 of the Constitution that Treasury disclosed in our 2425 annual report has been raised in a number of Senate estimate sessions,” Treasury Secretary Jenny Wilkinson said on Thursday.
“While it’s never desirable to make such an error, I am impressed with how quickly the Treasury staff identified the issue, advised the treasurer, took corrective action, reviewed our systems and clearly disclosed the breach.
“Following careful consideration of this issue, I am satisfied these breaches amounted to an inadvertent oversight.
“No individuals are suspected of behaving improperly, and all individuals co-operated constructively with the reviews we undertook and the corrective action.
“On this basis, I do not consider there to be any suspected breaches of the APS code of conduct.”
Originally published as ‘Grubby assertions’: Senators clash over the future of Tomago smelter
