CQ Today – Voices before wind farms

This week, I have hit the road with Angus Taylor through regional Queensland. Over the past few years, I have worked with so many locals who are opposed to the rollout of large-scale wind and solar projects that risk their local environment and way of life. With Angus in town, I thought it would be a great opportunity for these people to tell the Leader of the Opposition about their troubles and concerns. So, together with Colin Boyce, we arranged to hold an energy forum at Gracemere. Then, last week, Karl Stefanovic reached out and said he wanted to do something with me in Central Queensland. “Perfect,” I said. So Karl stepped in to host the energy forum and we gave people an even bigger platform to have their voice heard. Karl has copped it for interviewing a far-right figure in the UK. But journalists have always interviewed controversial figures. Indeed, a few years ago, the ABC allowed someone who had threatened to kill ASIO officers to ask a question on its Q and A program. I think it is a good thing that Karl and others are allowing more voices to be heard. I do not always agree with those voices. But in a free society, I deserve to hear different opinions if I choose to. It is even better that Karl is helping to give a voice to people who have felt voiceless for so long in Central Queensland. People like Cedric and Therese Creed, who have fought against the Smoky Creek solar farm, which is set to cover thousands of hectares of prime agricultural land in their region. That project looked dead until Australian governments gave Rio Tinto a $2 billion subsidy. Why do our taxes have to go to one of the biggest companies in the world to help pay for its green ambitions when we were told for years that renewable energy was the “cheapest form of power”? People like Petrina Morgan, who has been helping to fight against large-scale batteries that are planned to be installed just hundreds of metres from someone’s home. Large-scale batteries are industrial equipment, and they should be placed in industrial zones, not next to residential homes. The day after the Karl Stefanovic show, Angus, Colin and I headed out to a real industrial facility at the Stanwell coal-fired power station. On Monday this week, coal supplied 70 per cent of Queensland’s electricity needs. We need coal to keep our lights on, and the Stanwell Power Station is one of the best and most reliable power stations in the world. Stanwell is also building a battery that will help keep its power output more stable. This is where batteries should go: at industrial facilities, not next to people’s homes. The new LNP state government has also said that it will keep coal-fired power stations running. That is great news for our local community, as Stanwell provides hundreds of good-paying jobs. Each year, Stanwell is oversubscribed with young Central Queenslanders hoping to secure trainee and apprenticeship positions. Keeping coal-fired power stations running is also helping to reduce power prices. Queensland has just experienced the biggest reduction in wholesale power prices in the country. That is thanks to a more sensible approach to energy from the LNP government. We just need to do the same across Australia. If we ran our coal-fired power stations 80 per cent of the time — they are currently running only about 60 per cent of the time — that would be the equivalent of bringing three new coal-fired power stations online overnight. That would reduce power prices, just as is happening in Queensland. With more energy resources per person than any other country in the world except Saudi Arabia, we can lower energy prices and reduce the cost of living. We just need to use all of our energy resources again.