The Point Live: Sussan Ley finishes off worst week as leader so far. As it happened

We made it through the parliament sitting, but now there are planes to catch and bills to pay, so we shall leave you here and try and beat the mass exodus that is Australian parliamentarians running for the exit after a double sitting week.

We will be back with the last sitting week (THAT WE KNOW OF) in a fortnight’s time. Thank you to how many of you came along for this soft launch of The Point Live – my goodness, we have all been humbled and are feeling very grateful for your support. We will all still be working away, so don’t be shy if you have questions in between our blogs – we are always around.

Especially me. Under contract, I am not allowed to leave my computer for more than two hours, or a fairy gets it. Should have read the fine print.

But seriously – make sure you check out The Point every day – we will have more features, more explainers, fact checks, analysis and opinion and a few more things as we continue to expand. We are loving your feedback so far and are taking it all on board. And yes – we ARE working on a quiz. We’ll have that for you soon.

A very big thank you to everyone who helped, listened to the rants, laughed and cried as we muddled our way through another sitting of this mess we call parliament. We will be back very soon for the last (FOR NOW) go around.

Until then – take care of you Ax

How did Mike Bowers see QT?

On Tuesday, Barnaby Joyce took to Sky News to complain solar and wind projects had “carpeted” his electorate.

“I come from a seat, Laura, where 31 per cent of the area of the New England is going to be covered in solar panels and wind turbines. I don’t think people ever comprehend that”

If that number sounds absurdly high, that’s because it is. New England is 75,000 square kilometres in size, so 31% of it would be bigger than Sydney and Melbourne put together.

You would think somebody else would’ve noticed if that much land was set to be covered in renewables, but his Sky News interview seems to be the only place that 31% figure has ever appeared on the internet.

And if you don’t trust us on this being wrong, trust Barnaby. He followed up his claim with:

We’ve got 400 square kilometres of solar panels coming into our electorate… then 4,000 square kilometres of wind turbines and the associated transmission lines”

So now he claims 4,400 square kilometres will be covered by solar and wind projects, or just 5.8% of New England – less than one fifth of the first number.

We couldn’t find a source for that either, and though it’s closer to a realistic figure, it still overstates the amount of land that renewables currently, or probably ever will, cover in New England.

Barnaby might hate electricity that comes from the wind, but he seems fine sourcing facts from thin air.

Verdict: Fanciful

For those interested in how the Australian CDC debate ended up, Croakey has a very good article looking at the end result, which you can read here.

As has become his habit, Anthony Albanese wraps up the final question time of the week with a review of what he believes is Labor’s best hits.

“We are delivering, they are divided, divisive and despairing, they only have two settings; talking Australia down and dragging each other down. We are building Australia’s future. They are afraid of it.”

And that’s the last question time of the week and the fifth last one of the year.

So what did we learn?

Not to keep beating a dead horse like this – but nothing we didn’t know already. Despite some commentators claiming yesterday that the Coalition had Labor on the defence, that seems like some very wishful thinking – because it hasn’t been the reality. And it is not just me saying it, it’s been the defenders of the Coalition saying it. Which would be like me suddenly criticising Dolly Parton.

Because the Coalition don’t have any policies, they don’t have any lines of attack. They are falling back on either lies/mistruths (depending on how generous you want to be) which are very easily flicked away because of how obvious they are, or old attack lines that no longer make any sense.

It’s a party looking for a question, not just an answer.

People like to say that gas is needed as a bridging fuel to help us get to net zero. They claim that gas will speed up the transition to renewables. No one loves this argument more than the WA Premier Roger Cook.

On Radio National on Wednesday morning Roger Cook said:

“I think everyone recognises the anxieties that exist around fossil fuels at the moment. But certainly, when it comes to LNG it is going to continue to play an important role in the transition to clean energy.”

But a secret report that the WA government commissioned and received at the beginning of the year warns that rather than helping with the transition, WA’s LNG exports might be slowing the switch to renewable energy.

The report highlights 5 risks, including:

• Resources are directed to gas infrastructure and away from low-carbon technologies.
• Long-lived gas infrastructure can create a dependence on gas, delaying the transition.
• Cheap gas can delay the price competitiveness of low-carbon technologies.
• Focus on gas can reduce innovation on renewable energy and storage.
• Cheap gas can drive up energy consumption and increase emissions

This report’s findings are similar to those from a CSIRO report commissioned by Woodside in 2019.

The science is clear, we need to transition away from fossil fuels. Instead, Australia is expanding not just gas but also coal. Claims that this will help reduce emissions in the long run are deeply flawed.

This all highlights how wrong it was from the Federal Environment Minister to approve Woodside’s North West Shelf extension to 2070. We need to phase out gas and coal and arguments that it is part of the solution should be rejected.

Sophie Scamps asks Mark Butler:

The Northern Beaches Hospital in Mackellar has provided both public and private services under a public rabbit partnership. Following the private operator Healthscope entering receivership in May this year the announcement public services would be transitioned to NSW Health was indeed very welcome. However there is great uncertainty about the continuation of the world-class private services delivered there. What reassurance can you provide my community regarding ongoing access to all the private services at Northern Beaches Hospital?

Butler:

I acknowledge the members advocacy or the return of this privatised hospital effectively to public hands. And can I remind the House that no Labor government has privatised hospitals over the last 30 years while Liberal government after Liberal government around the country has persisted with this failed experiment of privatising public acute care hospitals.

The first time I dealt with it was in the north-eastern suburbs of Adelaide back in the 1990s when Healthscope the same company was given the contract to run the Modbury Hospital. It was a debacle. We seen repeat after repeat of this failed Liberal Party experiment to privatise our public acute care hospitals. We know the auditor general report confirmed that sense of failure.

It does not integrate popularly into the system, that of the New South Wales order to general found and there is a tension between profit and proper clinical care that should not happen in an acute care public hospital the private hospital system has, is very different, it’s largely therefore planned procedures and of course. Go, the Liberal Party seeking to defend failed privatisation experiments because at the end of the day like Pavlov’s dog they return to the idea we should have a privatised model of healthcare. That’s not the Member’s view.

I do know though the very hard work of the New South Wales Minister for Health is doing here to unwind privatisation over a relatively short period of time is one that is seeking to reassure first of all doctors, nurses and other healthcare staff at that hospital that they’ll have jobs and clinical services at this hospital will be up to scratch.

I think there is a close process of consultation there. They will all have jobs offered, their entitlements will transfer to NSW Health if they choose to take up that offer.

As a member also knows South was is consulting closely with clinicians and the community about what privatise, what private hospital services will continue to be available on that precinct or on hospital site. I am keeping in touch with the New South Wales Minister about that.

As the Member knows this is all complicated by the fact Healthscope more broadly which runs well over 30 hospitals including Northern Beaches across the country is now in receivership so we are taking the lead as the Commonwealth or making sure there is continuity of service from all those other Healthscope hospitals but we took a decision as to governments NSW Health would leave on essentially unwinding arrangements and guaranteed private and public services on the Northern Beaches site but if the Member wants me to update her and keep representing these issues to the New South Wales Minister I’d be more than happy to.

Glenn Connley

The Western Australian government’s claim that its domestic gas production is helping Asia’s clean energy transition has been undermined in a leaked report – which it commissioned.

The report states “… there are substantial risks that natural gas could crowd out investments in renewable technology or delay the broader adoption of renewable energy technologies.”

These revelations come two months after Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt granted final approval for Woodside to extend the life of its North West Shelf gas project until 2070, but the report was received by the WA government in January.

The North West Shelf extension will result in over 4 billion tonnes of emissions, wiping out any emissions cuts by Australian governments many times over.

The report follows the leaking of a CSIRO report commissioned by Woodside which undermined similar claims, and a report by the US Department of Energy that found emissions from LNG could be greater than coal emissions in customer countries.

“The government for a long time now has been trying to make the ludicrous argument that if you extract and export more gas, which is a fossil fuel, it will be good for the climate and reduce emissions,” said Dr Richard Denniss, co-CEO of The Australia Institute.

“That’s not true,  because climate change is caused by fossil fuels and gas is one of the main fossil fuels.

“It is no surprise the report was kept secret. It cost taxpayers $400,000 and did not support the government’s claims.”

The member for Dawson (I am not learning his name unless I have to. My head is already to full of men with opinions. I don’t need more) asks:

My question is to the prime minister, when asked about the prime minister’s promise to reduce power bills by $275, the Labor member for Solomon said and I quote, how long are you guys going to hang onto that to $275 piece? Prime Minister, are our power bills $275 lower now than in May 2022?

(This promise was two elections ago, was not raised at the last election, and was hijacked by the global inflation crisis. I am no defender of this government, but come on. Update the attack lines!)

Albanese:

I thank the member for his question and of course, what we know is that our friend the Member for Hume, had an interesting thing prior to 2022, where he actually he actually intervened to change the law, to hide where power prices were.

And I’m not sure why he’s here or not here, I wish him well.

Yesterday, of course they had another quote from the Member for Solomon, I don’t know how he got onto Sky News! But I congratulate… (INTERJECTIONS). I congratulate him for squeezing in between all those Liberal frontbenchers who have spent day after day, week after week, giving us, I assure you quotable quotes, quotable quotes, that are there for ever. Bagging each other, speaking about how Australia will become a pariah state, if, if they accepted the view of those opposite, of those opposite and the National Party, and some of the Liberal Party about abolishing net zero. Because we have a very clear position and it comes to energy going forward. It is to support the cheapest form of new energy, which is renewables.

To then support as well it being backed up by batteries and storage as well as gas for firming capacity as well.

That is our position, that is the way forward, not the fantasy that those are indulging in.

The Shadow Treasurer and his advisors seem to think they are on a winner by suggesting that government spending is preventing the RBA from cutting interest rates.

Ted O’Brien asked Chalmers: “The RBA ‘s forecast shows that if it were to offer any further rate relief, inflation would not get back to the 2.5% target. Noting the National accounts show Government consumption still growing faster than household consumption, will the Treasurer admit, that with his foot on the accelerator and the governors on the break, he is making it impossible for the RBA to offer further relief?”

A couple things.

The RBA forecasts do no such thing. The Statement on Monetary Policy includes the assumption that the cash rate will fall to 3.3% by December next year (so basically one cut from the current. 3.6%). And the RBA also estimates that by December next year the trimmed mean inflation level will be 2.7%. That is within the 2% to 3% target range that is the RBA’s target. The RBA only “targets” 2.5% because that is the midpoint and so it is a natural place to aim – but the actual goal is just to be consistently between 2% to 3%.

Then we get to government spending. The way to measure this is the growth of public demand – because that is the amount of extra demand the government is putting into the economy.

Yes, it is currently higher than household consumption growth, but that is because household consumption growth is SO DAMN LOW!!

When households are not growing their spending, the best thing a government can do is help provide some stimulus to the economy. That is what the governments have always done. And incidentally it is what the previous LNP government:

From 2015-2020 when household spending growth was as low as it is now, public demand helped keep things from falling over – and guess what, during this time interest rates were still cut!

One way to look at the amount of extra impetus the public spending is giving is to compare it to household consumption growth.

As you can see through 2024 public demand was above household consumption but the most recent figures show, the gap has dropped considerably.

So the suggestion that the government is preventing further rates cuts is pretty spurious. And given GDOP is projected to grow at just a mere 2%, an argument could be made that there should be more government spending to keep the economy going.