Australian Conservation Foundation says Coalition and Labor failing workers and risking the country’s energy security
A Senate inquiry into the retirement of coal-fired power stations towards lower-emissions energy sources split three ways.
Photograph: Dan Himbrechts/AAP
A major environment group has blasted Australia’s political parties for squabbling while energy security suffers after a Senate inquiry into the retirement of coal-fired power stations split three ways.
The Senate’s environment and communications references committee has
been inquiring into mechanisms for an orderly transition away from
coal-fired power to lower emissions energy sources for several months.
At the conclusion of the deliberations, the Greens, Labor and the Coalition all produced separate reports about the best way to manage the change, which were tabled in the Senate on Wednesday evening.
The main report, authored by the Greens, called on the government to
adopt a national energy transition plan and a mechanism for the orderly
retirement of coal-fired power stations. It also recommended the
establishment of an energy transition authority to manage the transition
for affected workers and communities.
Labor produced a separate report calling on the government to
establish mechanisms to support a “just transition” including a national
framework for worker redeployment schemes modelled on the Victorian government’s Latrobe Valley worker transfer scheme.
The Coalition declared the majority report did not “adequately or fairly reflect the evidence presented to the committee”.
“Further, the Coalition senators object to the ideologically driven
conclusions, which are counter to the government’s technology agnostic
policy approach.” The Australian Conservation Foundation blasted the rolling contention among Australia’s parliamentarians over climate and energy policy.
“The final report into the closure of the coal industry, with
dissenting reports from both Labor and Coalition senators, highlights
the squabbling that has characterised energy policy in Australia over
the last decade,” said the ACF’s climate change program manager, Gavan
McFadzean.
McFadzean said the ACF had “come to expect fossil fuel ideology and
nonsense from the Coalition but we are also disappointed federal Labor
have missed an opportunity to show courage and lead in the inevitable
structural reform, by failing to agree the early and orderly closure of
Australia’s coal-fired generation capacity”.
“Unless parties can start working together to ensure a just
transition for workers, both they and Australia’s energy security will
suffer.”
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