PETER STEFANOVIC:
The Australian Energy Market Operator is calling for urgent investment to safeguard the nation’s grid from blackouts and power delays. Its 2023 report warns Australia could face a decade of uncertain power supply. It warns the poor reliability of gas and coal generators in South Australia and Victoria could mean those states may experience power problems from this summer. AEMO says renewable energy and storage projects must come online to replace coal‑powered generation. So, a couple of stories there to talk about. Joining us live now is the Assistant Treasurer, Stephen Jones.
So, good morning Stephen, we’ll start there. AEMO forecasts an increasing risk of rolling blackouts this summer. Expectations have worsened in just six months. Is that your expectation too?
STEPHEN JONES:
Look, the report actually underscores the importance of the government’s policy in this area after 10 years of policy uncertainty and inaction by the former government. That’s what has led us to this situation. Our policy about Rewiring the Nation and bringing in more generation capacity through our capacity mechanism are the answers to this and Energy Minister Chris Bowen has been working hard to ensure that we are getting more capacity into the system. But, Pete, we can’t get away from the fact that this is what happens when you have had 10 years of policy uncertainty, a complete flip‑flop on policy in the energy space. It means we’ve effectively had investors not knowing where to put their money or how to invest. We’ve seen energy leave the system and not enough response under the former government to get more energy supply into the system.
STEFANOVIC:
Right, yeah.
JONES:
We’re turning that around. It can’t be done overnight, but our policies are the answer and AEMO has confirmed in its most recent report that that is the direction we have to go in.
STEFANOVIC:
The energy transition is faltering, though, isn’t it?
JONES:
Look, it would have been much better if we had been in this position and if we’d been doing the things we’re doing today 10 years ago, but, unfortunately, the previous government couldn’t agree with itself, let alone the Parliament or the country, with a direction forward on energy. The rest of the world moved forward. Australia went backwards. It’s going to take a bit of time to catch up. But our policies through Rewiring the Nation and putting in place an energy capacity mechanism, which is encouraging more investment into the market, the building of more cleaner, renewable, cheaper energy is the only way forward, and that’s the direction that this government has taken.
STEFANOVIC:
Okay. On airlines, Stephen, Catherine King, she’s had a revolving door of excuses as to why Qatar was blocked from extra flights to Australia. So, what is the real reason why the government came to that decision?
JONES:
Look, these are decisions made in the national interests and an important point to make here: these access agreements are agreements that are made between countries, country to country, not country and an airline. And I think Catherine has explained and the Prime Minister has explained that these are decisions made in the national interest. But I’m glad you’ve asked me this point. Can I say, a comment I made a couple of days ago has been completely misconstrued by some? I made the completely uncontroversial statement that the Australian Government wants to ensure that our airline industry is viable and competitive, that it’s delivering good services to customers. A viable airline industry requires a profitable airline industry, but all airlines, Qantas, all the airlines have an obligation to their workers and to their customers and, clearly, over the recent time, Qantas has fallen short of that. The Prime Minister has made his views on that quite clear in relation to a couple of areas. So, has the aviation minister, Catherine King.
We will be releasing an aviation industry green paper in the very near future. It will go to competition issues and it will go to industry viability and sustainability issues and we’ll have a very robust debate around those settings.
STEFANOVIC:
Just on that – but when it comes to a reason why, there’s so many different excuses. We talk about propping up or keeping Qantas’ profits high. It’s also the human rights incident in Doha –
JONES:
No, no, I just want to pick you up on that. I want to pick you up on that because this has got away over the last couple of days and if it’s attributed to comments I’ve made – I’ve made the uncontroversial comment that we need all of our airline operators to be viable and profitable in this country –
STEFANOVIC:
So, keeping profits high –
JONES:
– because the opposite of remaining viable and profitable is they fall over and customers – no, I’m not saying profits high. I’m saying that in the airline industry, all of the operators need to be viable.
STEFANOVIC:
Yeah, so profitable.
JONES:
We have seen in our history what happens when they’re not. We see airlines falling over, customers and workers left high and dry, and we don’t want to see that happen. So, the aviation industry green paper will be directed at ensuring that we have viability and competition in our airline industry, because that’s in our national interest, but it’s also in the interest of customers and consumers –
STEFANOVIC:
Okay, but the decision to nix Qatar from extra flights, who made that call? Was it Catherine King?
JONES:
This is a decision of the minister; the delegation lies with the minister and the minister alone, but I want to make this point because it’s also been misconstrued over the last little while, including in recent comments just made on your program by Peter Dutton: these are agreements made between governments, not between government and a particular airline, but agreements made between governments. And in relation to our current settings, we’re already seeing new international carriers or international carriers are putting more flights into Australia and that’s a good thing –
STEFANOVIC:
Right. But when you say governments, was our Prime Minister coming over the top?
JONES:
And that’s a good – no, it’s not. These are agreements made between governments and this is a decision of the minister and the minister alone, because under our legislation and under our delegations, it is the minister who has the discretion to make these decisions, but stressing importantly these are agreements made between governments not between a government and one particular airline.
STEFANOVIC:
Was Qantas involved in the conversations?
JONES:
I wasn’t privy to the conversations, so I can’t answer that question, Peter.
STEFANOVIC:
Okay. Also, there has been a report in the last couple of days that Qatar may be interested in investing in Virgin. Perhaps that brings FIRB into play. Maybe we don’t want that. Is that a possibility?
JONES:
Peter, all of these decisions will be made in the regular way in accordance with Australian law through independent bodies. The FIRB is an independent body making recommendations to government, so all of those sorts of decisions, whether it’s in relation to the aviation industry or any other international investor, which triggers the FIRB rules, they will be made in the normal course of things and in accordance with the law.
STEFANOVIC:
Okay. Has Qatar made an approach that you know of that they might be interested in investing in Virgin?
JONES:
I have no knowledge of these things, Peter. I’m not the minister responsible for aviation so I have no knowledge of these things.
STEFANOVIC:
Sure. Can this decision be overturned? Will you make a different decision or are we going to keep things as they are?
JONES:
Again two points: this is a discretion around a – a delegation made to Catherine King as the minister responsible not the Prime Minister, but to Catherine King as the minister responsible. And in relation to the agreements that we have with international carriers and other countries, these are agreements that are made on a government-to-government basis, not a government-to-airline‑industry basis, but on a government-to-government basis and they take into account a whole range of issues –
STEFANOVIC:
But their government runs the airline though.
JONES:
– in particular the national interest. Like I said, irrespective of who the government is in relation to a particular airline, these are agreements that are made on a government-to-government basis. They are not decisions that are made on a government‑to‑one‑particular‑airline basis.
STEFANOVIC:
Stephen Jones, appreciate your time as always. We’ll talk to you again soon.