Australians are sick of being lectured to about the energy transition. What they want to hear is how energy will be made cheaper.

For the last four and a half years, energy policy has been driven by ideology, political targets and government picking winners rather than by the basic realities of keeping the lights on and Australian businesses competitive. That is why the Coalition’s Scrap Net Zero (Cheaper Energy) Bill starts with a simple proposition: the more energy, the better.

Australia should have an energy system built around three non-negotiable principles: affordability, reliability and security. Everything else should be secondary.

The Coalition’s Scrap Net Zero (Cheaper Energy) Bill is designed to restore these principles. It will be introduced within 30 days of the Coalition sitting on the government benches.

The Coalition’s Bill will:

• Repeal the Climate Change Act 2022. By removing the legislated net zero targets it would remove the distortion that has occurred under Labor to Australia’s electricity market.
• Remove the safeguard mechanism. The safeguard mechanism imposes costs on Australia’s productive industries which has driven jobs offshore reducing our manufacturing capacity and led to massive industry assistance programs to prop up some industries.
• Repeal the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard Act of 2024. This has impacted on vehicle choice and pricing in the Australian automative sector.
• Revoke four offshore wind energy zone across the Hunter, Illawarra, Southern Ocean, and Bunbury regions – there is no social licence and no community acceptance for these four zones. This would leave the zones at Gippsland and Tasmania.
• Repeal all legislative prohibition on nuclear energy. Nuclear energy is emissions free and can provide a constant source of electricity to power industry, data centres and meet the future energy demands that renewables cannot meet and for when coal capacity is reduced.
• Introduce a renewable energy code of conduct to ensure developers earn their social license from the community that they operate in.
• Require that any energy funding provided to the states and territories is conditional on prioritising energy affordability, and reliability.
• Redirect the Australian Energy Regulator to have primary regard to affordability and reliability which will put households and businesses at the centre of regulatory decision making.

ENDS

Media contact: Phil Connole E | philip.connole@aph.gov.au