Barnaby Joyce speaking at a renewable energy zone hearing

The Land

Barnaby Joyce speaking at the Armidale inquiry hearing into the impact of renewable energy zones on rural and regional NSW. Video supplied by Vikki Campion.

Transcript

00:00The roads are virtuous and you see them in cities. Roads are virtuous and you see them in cities.

00:05But intermittent power precincts, which can quite ably be built off the coast of Sydney or off the coast of Melbourne,

00:12are not built there because apparently the virtue runs out when you're inside of the cities.

00:17It is an issue that the virtue doesn't go as far as getting an ironclad, an ironclad promise

00:25that any of the solar panels will have anything to do with the slave labour that constructs solar panels in this town province.

00:31Or that the cobalt in the solar panels doesn't come from the child labour in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

00:42These are things that in that virtuous, swami presentations we get, which are distinctly left behind.

00:49It's a swindle, Mr Chair, in the fact that so many promises are made to local communities and so little is delivered.

00:57Let's look at Glennon's as a classic example.

01:01Basically billions invested in intermittent power precincts.

01:05What's happened to the town?

01:07Has its population grown? Are there new industries there? Are there new jobs there?

01:12There's only probably a handful, maybe one or two.

01:15There's no car park at the intermittent power precinct.

01:18It's hardly anybody works there.

01:20Yet they promise so much.

01:22So why is it happening, Mr Chair?

01:24It's happening because there is a massive pecuniary benefit that goes to a select few.

01:32And we can see those proponents out there at the moment.

01:34Mr Forrest, Chinese overseas companies, international companies from China, from Singapore, from France, from Holland.

01:44These are the real benefits of the swindle on the Australian people and the swindle on the people of New England.

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