Scott Morrison says partisan politics has driven up power prices

Treasurer Scott Morrison has flagged further support from the Turnbull frontbench for bipartisan energy policy, acknowledging that politics as usual has driven up power prices, and calling for both parties to “meet in the middle”.

Scott Morrison examines a lump of coal, which he used
in an attempt to belittle Labor. The treasurer is
now calling for bipartisan energy policy.

The remarks, reported in Rockhampton’s Morning Bulletin, follow a speech Morrison delivered in Adelaide last week where he admitted building new coal power plants would not bring down power prices.

The statements appear to mark a shift from Morrison’s previous interjections in the energy policy debate, which included him brandishing a piece of coal in question time.

Read Michael Slezak’s story on The Guardian - “Scott Morrison says partisan politics has driven up power prices.”

Coalition’s ‘clean coal’ plan revealed to be an ‘idiotic’ fantasy

Treasurer Scott Morrison with a
piece of "clean coal".

It’s probably not surprising that Coalition ministers and MPs were cradling the lump of coal brought to Question Time on Thursday by Treasurer Scott Morrison as though it were a treasure from Aladdin’s Cave. After all, their own plan for cheap and clean coal is steeped in as much fantasy as that favourite childhood tale.

Over the past few months the Coalition has been promoting “clean coal” and supposedly modern coal plant technology as a solution for Australia’s power crisis (high prices and high emissions), all the while attacking renewables, and wind energy in particular.

It reached idiotic proportions on Thursday after Engie chose not to switch on its Pelican Point gas plant and supply customers, including many of its own, with power in the midst of a major heatwave (temperatures at 47.8°C in Port Augusta), forcing rolling blackouts that affected 90,000 customers.

The Coalition then chose to blame wind energy, and the theatre culminated in the supply of a lump of coal to parliament house, which, as the Guardian’s Katharine Murphy pointed out, illustrated little more than their own stupidity. “What idiocy is this?” she asked.

Read Giles Parkinson’s RenewEconomy story - “Coalition’s ‘clean coal’ plan revealed to be an ‘idiotic’ fantasy.”