Bill: Energy and Legislation Amendment (Energy Safety) Bill 2025: Council Amendments

BILL DEBATE

‘ENERGY AND LAND LEGISLATION AMENDMENT (ENERGY SAFETY) BILL 2025: COUNCIL AMENDMENTS’.

Wednesday 14 May 2025.

James NEWBURY (Brighton) (14:57):

I rise to briefly speak on the Amendments that the Government has moved be agreed to, which effectively kill feed-in tariffs in Victoria.

You might be surprised to hear about it, because there was no real announcement and there has been no Minister’s statement.

In fact, this is an Amendment that has been snuck in on a Bill in the Council quietly in the dead of night. There has been no associated announcement with it, which is the form of the Government. In the Upper House we made the point strongly, though we did not divide on the Amendment, that what this Amendment does is kill feed-in tariffs in Victoria.

A concern that we have as a Coalition is that people made decisions based on information at the time, and the feed-in tariff was a significant part of many people in the community’s decision-making factors when taking up solar. And why wouldn’t it be? For the Government to scrap it effectively without any notification, without any real consultation and certainly without any Ministerial fanfare – I mean, on this side of the Chamber we look forward to the Minister doing a dance in her Minister’s statements and getting up and about. On this one we have heard nothing about scrapping the feed-in tariffs. What I found very interesting when the Minister spoke about the scrapping of the feed-in tariffs earlier was that taking money away from people, in the Minister’s own words, was proof of success. Only Labor could possibly say taking money away from people is ‘proof of success’.

I know that many of the colleagues I have spoken to about this have had the reduction in the rate of the feed-in tariff raised with them over time. I certainly have. When people have made decisions about solar, it was certainly in their minds. The Minister said something about what the Coalition had previously done, and of course it was all wrong – I mean, clearly, there would be no other way.

At the last election, some three and a bit years ago, we made a significant policy announcement around solar and batteries. We leaned in on batteries because we knew we were not having anywhere near the uptake on batteries that we needed as a state, so we proposed extending the rebate scheme. At the time, people could seek a rebate for either solar or battery. We sought to change that, because we knew that it was important. I do note the Government has worked out what a battery is more recently and they tried to come up with policy to do something about that, some several years after we made our policy announcement, which I would have loved to implement had we won the election.

The Minister also spoke about people who rent and live in apartments, and it is a big challenge. We talked about it when we made that huge announcement at the last election on policy. We talked a lot about renters and people who live in apartments and the need to provide them with an option. It is a very difficult policy issue. When the Minister talks about solar being rolled out, it is true, but what the Minister does not talk about is the absolute disparity for people who do not own their home. It is something that, frankly, Governments have failed on – to ensure that homeowners who provide accommodation through rental have the policy levers they need to make sure that solar is available for those people too. I know in my own community in places like Elwood people who rent would love to have that choice on their property. We spoke about that as a coalition and the need to incentivise homeowners to take up that choice for their tenants where their tenant is requesting it and, frankly, remove the financial hurdle to make that happen. When it comes to providing for renters, this government has not yet fixed that policy space that absolutely requires addressing.

When it comes to batteries, the government has worked out what a battery is, so they should be acknowledged for that. But in terms of the actual policy response, it should be noted that several years ago we had a very forward leaning policy at the last election, which the government has obviously read in terms of recognising some of the things we raised. It should be noted that at the same time we did announce legislating climate targets, which the former Premier dead opposed. Post the election, the government again obviously read our policy and recognised the need – after the Premier had left. The Premier changed and was on the way out, so they recognised again the need to legislate. I remember having an argument in this Chamber with him about it where he said, ‘Absolutely,’ I think he said, ‘when hell freezes over,’ to me on legislating targets.

A member interjected.

James NEWBURY: It is in Hansard, Minister.

I would say this Amendment, when it comes to feed-in tariffs, has been snuck in. No-one outside this Chamber, and I am pretty sure most people even in the chamber right now who are not listening, would even know feed-in tariffs are being scrapped. People do not know, and it is shocking that taking away that financial incentive, which people leaned on when making a decision, has been described by the Minister as proof of success.

As I said before, only a Labor Government could take money away from people and say that is proof of success. There are people who will find out about these changes and who, having not been aware of them, will say, ‘When did this happen? How did this happen? Why did no-one tell us?’ Those are very fair and reasonable questions. Although we will not be dividing, we would certainly put it to the Government and say that the least the Government could do is advise people of the sneaky change they have made.