22 May 2024
Topics: Victorian Government possible reparations and Indigenous-only seats, Nova Peris’ resignation from republican movement, nuclear, Eraring
EO&E
Peta Credlin:
Let’s get into things with my panel. Shadow Environment Minister Jonathon Duniam and senior fellow at the Menzies Research Centre and a bit of a wandering energy expert, Nick Cater, coming to us again from overseas. Welcome to you both. So I’ll start if I can in Victoria where the Allan Government has refused to rule out reparations and Indigenous-only seats in the Parliament in the middle of these treaty negotiations. We saw that with the Minister on Tuesday, Natalie Hutchins, telling a hearing about this, the treaty process, that absolutely everything is on the table. She also refused to answer questions on whether private land could be acquired by the Government and handed over to Indigenous groups. Tom Elliott was asking Auntie Jill Gallagher, the former inaugural Treaty Advancement Commissioner about all of this on 3AW this morning.
Jill Gallagher:
I think reparation should be on the table and it might not be in the way of money form. It might be in the way of empowerment, it might be in the way of land, but definitely not private land, Tom, you know, I mean, no one is going to lose their private land.
Peta Credlin:
And Nick, what I perhaps I am the most angry about is the option of seats in the Parliament being reserved for people based on race. They call this apartheid in other countries, but the left here want to pretend it’s some sort of reconciliation or progress. I mean, this is appalling.
Nick Cater:
Yeah I mean, the first thing I’d say is I thought that the Allan Government was very driven by the polls. We had a very reliable poll on this last year on October the 14th. We all know what the result of that was – 60:40. So you know, they should listen to what people were saying and people were not speaking about just a narrow particular constitutional change. They were talking about the whole idea that we should treat some Australian citizens differently on the basis of race or ancestry. That’s just not part of the Australian way. So I think most Australians, vast majority of Australians, I’m very confident will be as appalled as you and I are with the idea of reparations from who to whom and why, and the, but definitely I’m with you on this, Peta, I think the idea we should set aside seats in Parliament based on race, you know, this is something that I used to report on 30 years ago from Malaysia and we thought it was appalling. It’s not part of the Australian way and it should be off the table and the sooner Premier Allan puts his off the agenda, the better it’ll be.
Peta Credlin:
And it has to be killed off in Victoria because I mean this, what happens in Victoria, it’s like a cancer in other Labor states and it’ll go right around the country and it’ll be basically the Voice by stealth, will be treaty by stealth, and then it’ll push its way back into Canberra. The republican movement suffered a pretty big blow today. The Co-chair, Nova Peris, she resigned and this is due to comments made by the other Co-chair, Craig Foster, on Israel. This is extraordinary. I can’t say I’m not unhappy. I have no truck with the Republican cause, Senator Duniam, but Nova Peris made the comment before. Very brave for this move. I have to say I also commend her.
Senator Duniam:
Yeah, I’m with you in commending Nova Peris for what she’s done. I consider her to be a very thought-through individual. Someone who doesn’t make rash decisions. Craig Foster seems to be an individual who will find any passing bandwagon of the left’s cause and jump on it. Whether it is the matter relating to the Israel-Gaza conflict or the failed Voice referendum, or indeed the republican movement, he will be attached to it. Now, is this a good or a bad thing for the republican referendum? Well, given he attached himself so heavily to the Voice referendum, perhaps is a good thing for them but at the end of the day, frankly, he, a great soccer player, should stick to his knitting and perhaps encourage young people to get out and get fit and get off their devices and stop meddling in politics.
Peta Credlin:
Sage advice. Let’s go to nuclear energy if we can. There’s a report out today, GenCost, this is from the CSIRO’ estimates. They’re saying that a large scale nuclear reactor in Australia could cost something like $17 billion. They make that sound very scary, but let’s not forget Nick Cater, Snowy 2.0 that just got revised up in the budget a couple of weeks ago, that’s going to cost us $12 billion. Now, I don’t believe it’s 12, it’ll be more by the time we actually see it. If we can get Snowy, which is basically water going around like a battery or a large scale nuclear reactor for about the same money, I know where I want to go. I want to go nuclear.
Nick Cater:
That’s right. As I told you last week, I was in Finland. I went to the nuclear reactor to which was completed last year. State of the art, third generation, pressurised water reactor cost them $9.6 billion Australian for 1.6 gigawatts, that’s a bargain. Now even if we had to pay more than that, we probably would because of inflation and costs in one way or another, but we know the technology is there, we know it works. Sweden, right, 40 per cent nuclear. They were going to close down some of their nuclear plants, the previous government. The new government came in and said no, we’re not going to do it, they’re keeping their nuclear open and they’re looking for more. And that’s in a country which has got abundant hydroelectricity. They’re sensible. That’s why electricity is cheaper in Sweden than it is in Germany right now, and why their industry is not going overseas in the way that German industry’s going. I think it’s a no-brainer Peta, I really do.
Peta Credlin:
So do I and lest our industries go overseas, we’ve got to get serious about it. Jonno, we know that there’s a deal soon to be announced about extending the life of Eraring. They wanted to close it. They’ve worked out they actually need coal to keep the lights on in NSW. But what’s tied up in this, this is the reports today, there’s about one thousand coal miners worried that they could lose their job if Eraring’s operator, Origin, doesn’t renew its contract with Centennial Coal. Two Centennial mines supply the station with its coal. This makes me run with that refrain, you know, where all the green jobs now? We’re told renewables are cheap, they’re not cheap. We’re told that everyone will just migrate to a green job. Where’s the green jobs for the coal miners now?
Senator Duniam:
The green jobs happen to be a myth, Peta. They’re not coming. I hate to tell the people of the Hunter that they’ve been sold the porky on this one, and the rest of Australia. They’re not coming. The transition isn’t going away. Anthony Albanese promised it would. And those thousand jobs, those thousand households whose livelihoods depend on coal-fired energy generation, well, those jobs are in jeopardy because their local member who says, as I read today in the media, you know, ‘hasn’t got much he can say about this at this point’. He should be standing up for their jobs. Everyone knows that we need reliable, baseload generation including coal to keep the lights on. We haven’t got this green transition under control that Labor promised we’d have. Those jobs are in question because they have not got this sorted out and it is up to them to fix this. Green jobs aren’t coming. Secure the coal jobs today.
Peta Credlin:
Thank you, gents.