On ABC RN with Fran Kelly this morning, Anthony Albanese continued cleaning up Labor’s position on coal after his deputy squibbed it on Insiders on Sunday:
Q: Should the government be funding a feasibility study for new coal-fired power stations?
Albanese: No. Exclamation mark. This is quite outrageous. Here we have, essentially, the government pretending that the world isn’t changing. What we need is a transition to a clean energy economy. And the truth is that no private sector operation will touch a new coal-fired power plant with a barge pole. It can’t get the proper insurance, they can’t get financing. And that’s because renewables are cheaper. And the risk factor with regard to investing in a new coal-fired power plant means that it simply doesn’t stack up. And what we have with this $4m is essentially you can add it to the sports rorts and add it to the other areas whereby the $150m program for women’s sports that didn’t actually fund women’s sport, as $4m just for political purposes. This is hush money. Hush money for the climate change deniers in the Coalition. I mean, Matt Canavan yesterday made the most extraordinary comment about renewables as the dole bludgers of the system. The fact is that the cheapest new energy sources in Australia today are solar and wind.
Q: So, let me put this to you because you don’t support the feasibility study money, but your deputy, Richard Marles, struggled on Sunday to answer whether Labor would support new coal-fired power generators if they were funded by industry. You have just said what we need is a transition to a clean energy economy. If it stacked up, if industry was prepared to back it, would a Labor government support it, allow it?
Albanese: You may as well ask me, Fran, if I support unicorns.
Q: This is important. Because do you have a position on this?
Albanese: Fran, we have a position which is that it does not stack up. It will not proceed. It doesn’t stack up. No private sector operator, Fran, right now, there is nothing to stop a private sector operator establishing a coal-fired power station.
Q; I understand. But why can’t you say that a Labor government would not allow any new coal-fired power stations to be built? Why can’t you say that?
Albanese: Well, because it’s not happening, Fran. It won’t happen. We do know that, Fran, we do know that because it’s reality. It’s like saying, “Do you know if the sun will come up this morning.”
