This isn’t a debate, it is monkey’s throwing poop at each other from pre-determined political positions. News.
Hundreds of thousands of householders facing power bill price hikes of up to $200 a year are set to secure more cost-of-living relief in the March budget.
But the energy rebate move, which is expected to be unveiled just days before the Prime Minister calls an election for May 3, is set to spark a major political showdown with Liberal leader Peter Dutton.
Accusing the government of “chasing its tail”, the Liberal leader has warned more handouts may not prove to be the answer.
…“Because of Anthony Albanese’s energy policy, your electricity bill is going to go up by nine per cent – that’s another nine per cent, that’s not a $275 cut, which is what the Prime Minister promised you…It’s now a $1300 increase in your electricity bill – and it’s not just your electricity bill that’s gone up under this Government, it’s also the cost of groceries,’’ Mr Dutton said.
…“I believe that there is a much better way, a much better path for our country. We have to have a balanced and sensible energy system and if we do that we can bring downward pressure on energy prices.
Nothing Dutton is proposing will bring down energy prices for many years, if ever. The marginal cost of electricity is set by gas, and there is no magical reserve of cheap gas to suddenly dig up. It is all in QLD where the gas export cartel occupies the reserves and intends to send it to China.
Beetaloo gas in the NT could help but it is too expensive to bring down prices and any increase in supply will be immediately matched by an increase in exports by the cartel.
Meanwhile, Albo is busy with counter lies. The Australian.
“What we have seen is substantial world movements in energy prices as a direct result of the long tail of Covid and supply-chain issues, but also of the Russian invasion of Ukraine,” the Prime Minister said on Thursday.
This is true but the coal price has long since crashed. Only the gas price remains elevated and, locally, only because Albo’s $12Gj price cap was an utter failure. Gas is the issue. The only issue for elrctricity prices.
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Andrew McKellar said…“We’ve got network-reliability issues, we’re seeing coal-fired generation becoming more unreliable and we haven’t made up the space yet with renewable capacity. We have to plug up that gap with more gas-generated capacity.”
Exactly. And the only way to get it is to use blanket domestic reservation plus, if needed, an export levy to set the local price.
Otherwise, as these monkey’s throw poop, it will get much, much worse.
The announcement of future price increases comes a day ahead of a meeting between Mr Bowen and his state counterparts where a Victorian proposal for the commonwealth to partially underwrite an LNG import terminal is expected to take centre stage.
Under the proposal, the Australian Energy Market Operator would be the anchor buyer of LNG from two facilities, a proposal that if adopted would likely accelerate the developments. The proposal is controversial as there are concerns it could add to domestic prices.
The gas will land today at $25Gj, double local prices. And inject a whole new price shock larger than the Ukraine War, with electricity prices up another 40%+.
If the rebates are scrapped as well, the 2026/27 inflation shock will be 4-5% and double it with spillovers.
The monkeys we appointed to lead our energy transformation are about to accidently stand on the big red button marked “Argentina. Do not touch”.
