Paul Murray: Outages and rejections offer Premier Roger Cook food for thought on his power play

If there’s one thing more fundamental to our lives than energy, it’s food. And maybe oxygen and water. And love. But that’s usually not on the ballot. So when a national industry group comes out and says Labor’s energy policies are irrationally forcing up food prices, we should all take notice. The cost-of-living crisis won’t go away just because Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the worst is behind us. And the pain being felt in Australian homes won’t change if the Reserve Bank makes one adjustment to mortgage imposts before the election — having lifted interest rates 13 times during the Albanese Government’s reign. But it might lessen if someone with a speck of common sense got hold of the ideological energy nightmare Labor has inflicted on the nation. This week, Independent Food Distributors Australia came out with a blistering attack on Labor’s plans for 82 per cent renewable energy by 2030 on the grounds it was driving up prices for consumers. “Based on the impact of the level of increase in energy pricing for food businesses, and the downstream impact for consumers … there should be a very serious look at the approach towards net-zero at present because of the damage that is being done,” IFDA chief executive Richard Forbes said. “It’s very clear … that the damage is affecting the viability of businesses and is affecting the ability of consumers to purchase the food that they would like. I don’t think it ever hurts to have a recalibration when people are hurting.” Mr Forbes said the “clear message” from IFDA’s 200 members — who use big chillers and freezers to store and supply food for 60,000 retailers — was that coal-fired power generation was being phased out too quickly and the renewables target was problematic. They also demanded Labor mandate more gas in the pathway to net zero to drive down energy costs. “The Government must take responsibility for a portion of the cost-of-living crisis, which is the cost of doing business, which is energy,” Forbes said. On the eve of Federal and State elections that will be fought principally on cost-of-living issues, the IFDA intervention was important on two levels. Firstly, it came from businesses at the coalface of the crisis who were directly linking Labor’s energy policies to the pain every Australian feels at the supermarket. Secondly, it sparked growing discontent among the nation’s peak business organisations which have previously been loath to criticise Labor’s net zero policies. It also came in a week of increasingly bad news for Labor’s renewables strategy that relies heavily on the green hydrogen dream to meet the obvious deficiencies of wind and solar. Following the humiliating retreat of hydrogen’s chief bloviator, Andrew Forrest, and the earlier axing of three major proposals, the Queensland Government on Monday dismantled the nation’s biggest project, a $12.5 billion plant and pipeline at Gladstone. Within days, energy giant BP iced a $600 million green hydrogen and biofuels project at Kwinana in the heart of Premier Roger Cook’s electorate. With Gladstone and the defunct Hunter Valley hub, it was one of six projects shortlisted for Federal Labor’s “Hydrogen Headstart” program, which offers $2b in subsidies. Faced with this litany of failure, Energy Minister Chris Bowen and Cook doubled down on their heavy exposure to green hydrogen and its role in their “all renewables” strategies. Cook called on Federal Labor to throw more good money after bad, having already pledged $61.5m of WA taxpayers’ cash on the dream. “I think everyone expects and wants the Federal Government to do more in relation to supporting these new nascent industries as part of our energy transition,” he said. What’s that they say about fools and other peoples’ money? Cook’s naivete was hardly surprising given his attitude to the widespread pole-top fires last month in the Western Power electricity network that hit 39,000 customers. How can a Government spruiking the biggest energy transformation in the State’s history run a network in such bad condition that it causes massive blackouts due to poor maintenance? Cook boasts about Labor keeping Western Power in State hands. He needs to show his Government can operate it competently. And how can the Premier get away with saying outages are “part and parcel” of a big energy network? They operate on the inherent basis of reliability. Which takes us back to food again. One of WA’s biggest vegetable producers, Sumich, runs nine farms north of Perth which lost power for four days from January 24 because of the pole top fires. It cost them $3m in crops that couldn’t be watered along with the picked produce in cold storage. They’ve been told the legislative protection given to the utility means any legal action would fail. The combined losses of all the market gardeners in the area were estimated at $15m-$20m for which they have been offered no meaningful compensation. “We spend around $15,000-$25,000 for each day of the year on power and we own around 100km of our own HV powerlines, so we have a good understanding of what needs to be done to maintain a network,” Vincent Tana said. “The fact is that Western Power have the means to prevent most of the pole top fires and they chose not to. “It’s devastating for so many especially for the smaller guys that just simply can’t carry these losses, not to mention people that just get sick of emptying their fridges every few months due to these preventable outages.” Western Power blamed “extreme weather conditions” for the outages. When they hit, the temperature was 25C and there had been around 2mm of rain. It’s not as though the Cook and McGowan Labor governments have struggled for revenue over the past eight years, even though they still blame their predecessors when anything goes wrong. An analysis of government finances done for Liberal leader Libby Mettam’s office by a former senior public servant shows that Labor has had double the income from royalties and GST that the Barnett government enjoyed in its two terms — $114b over the past eight years. And despite Treasurer Rita Saffioti’s bleating that her Government suffered ballooning population growth, the figures show a different story. WA’s population during Barnett’s terms grew 410,000. Under Labor, growth was 385,000. So who was doing more with less? Barnett spent $5.659b on health infrastructure. Labor has spent $3.213b — 46 per cent less. On education infrastructure, Barnett’s outlays were $4.318b against $3.763b. And while Labor had 15 per cent population growth, it managed to grow the public service by 21 per cent. While the Government might spin that some were nurses, doctors and the like, the figures show the biggest growth area at 39 per cent was “managers”. As the cost-of-living debate heats up before the March 8 election, the Liberals are also likely to target a big growth in fees and charges under Labor. The analysis shows the basic electricity supply charge has risen 133 per cent from 48.6¢ per unit when Labor came to power in 2017 to 113.2¢. The cost per unit is up 19.3 per cent. While Labor continues to peddle the lie that residential power bills have gone down — because of the rebates posted to consumers by the Federal and State governments — the truth is that while households haven’t had to pay the full amount, the actual bills have risen extraordinarily. In terms of other household costs imposed by the State Government, the water service charge has risen by 22.6 per cent, car regos by 34.6 per cent and five-year MDLs by 23.9 per cent. All while the Government was raking in twice as much revenue as its predecessor. The State Government is required to table a six-monthly report to Parliament on the consultants it engages. No report beyond June 2023 exists. However, for the six years that reports are available, Labor spent $67m on consultants, many of them “mates”. Using a yearly average, this works out to $89m over eight years, or the equivalent of putting on 784 additional teachers or 928 nurses. So the Liberals have a sound basis for a fight over cost-of-living if they’re up to it. The devastating results of the 2021 State election — a combination of residual COVID-era panic, Liberal Party internal self-harm and the plummeting popularity of then-PM Scott Morrison — have left them short of critical mass to mount a strong campaign. That aside, Cook has enormous gall to criticise the Liberals for inexperience. He must have forgotten that in a factional deal, his colleagues made him deputy leader of Labor’s caucus before he had even taken up his seat in parliament. He became a poor shadow health ministers — who consistently complained of ambulance ramping rates a fraction of those now — and an even worse health minister before getting kicked upstairs against his own faction’s wishes. He must be hoping that most voters have short memories.