Opposition Leader pitches gas policy in Sydney

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The parties are out campaigning today with the Opposition Leader in Sydney selling his energy policy to voters.

Transcript

00:00Peter Dutton, the opposition leader, in his first Sydney stop of the campaign in Sydney's

00:07West in the seat of McMahon, which is interestingly held by the energy minister, Chris Bowen,

00:14with a safe margin of 10 per cent, not necessarily one that the coalition would be thinking it

00:20can win, but trying to put a message there as it spruiks its energy policy.

00:27We know that one of the features of Peter Dutton's budget reply speech last Thursday

00:33night was around the opposition's new gas policy.

00:37It says we'll reduce power bills by forcing the gas giants to keep about 10 to 20 per

00:43cent of the product for domestic use.

00:46It claims that as a result of providing more of that supply into the market, that that

00:53would reduce the soaring cost of power bills.

00:57But the coalition has been under pressure to release the modelling, the analysis behind

01:03this policy, and also to put a figure, a dollar figure, on how much it believes it can reduce

01:09power prices as a result of this policy.

01:13We heard this morning from the coalition's campaign spokesperson, James Patterson, also

01:19the shadow energy minister, Ted O'Brien, but both unwilling to put a dollar figure

01:25on this.

01:26And likewise, when the opposition leader was speaking this morning at that event at a brick

01:33factory, this is what he had to say.

01:36People have spoken for years and years about an East Coast gas reservation.

01:40We have put the policy on the table.

01:42And it's about action now.

01:44It's about a positive plan to help Australians now with the cost of living pressures.

01:48I want to make sure that we can manage the economy well so that we can lower inflation.

01:52I want to make sure that we can help young Australians achieve the dream of home ownership

01:57again.

01:59So Peter Dutton speaking there, he did say, though, that there would be the release of

02:04analysis or modelling in the coming days, over the next few days of this campaign, which

02:10of course has only just begun.

02:12Peter Dutton also responded this morning to Labor's announcement that it would move to

02:18make price gouging by supermarkets illegal.

02:22Peter Dutton saying that the prime minister was, in his words, as weak as water and pointing

02:28to the coalition's policy of threatening to divest the sector as a crackdown, as a big

02:35stick measure, so to speak.

02:38Questioned as well, Peter Dutton was asked about whether he would change the laws to

02:45make it illegal, something that was put to him.

02:48And when he was pressed on that, saying that it's something that if he were to be elected

02:52and believed it was required to do, he would be supportive of that, but at the same time,

02:59critical of the government, saying that it hasn't gone far enough and spruiking the coalition's

03:04policy of divestiture as well.

03:08It does bear noting that the Greens have also pushed for this move to make price gouging

03:15in the supermarkets, by the supermarkets, illegal as well.

03:19So certainly cost of living still fronting up to be the main focus in the early days

03:26of this campaign.

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