Clive Palmer party backs renewable energy, putting heat on Coalition plans
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Version 0 of 1. The Palmer United Party has strongly backed the existing renewable energy target (RET), raising questions about the Abbott government’s ability to get changes to the law through the Senate. PUP candidate in the Western Australian Senate poll, Dio Wang, issued a press statement Tuesday saying the RET “must be maintained”. “I believe the RET scheme should remain as it is. It worries me when the government says everything is on the table in reviewing the RET,” he said. The RET was “the right scheme for maintaining and improving Australia’s environment”. The Abbott government has appointed veteran businessman Dick Warburton, a self-professed climate sceptic, to head an “extensive” review of the renewable energy target with terms of reference heavily focused on its impact on power prices. The renewable energy industry fears the review will lead to the target being wound back or even abolished. But abolition would require legislation. Labor and the Greens oppose any change to the target, and the independent senator Nick Xenophon has told Guardian Australia he believes Australia needs “a strong renewable energy target, but with more emphasis on baseload renewables”. PUP has two senators in the new Senate, which sits from July, and has formed a voting alliance with Victorian Motoring Enthusiast senator-elect Ricky Muir, so PUP’s stance makes it highly unlikely changes to the RET would pass the upper house. Wang said that since the last review of the RET was completed in December 2012, he believed the new review headed by Warburton is “a waste of taxpayers’ money”. Warburton, a veteran industrialist and chairman of the Westfield Retail Trust, described his views on climate science in a 2011 interview on ABC. “Well I am a sceptic. I’ve never moved away from that. I’ve always believed sceptical,’’ he said. “But a sceptic is a different person than a denier. I say the science is not settled. I’m not saying it’s wrong. I’ve never said it’s wrong, but I don’t believe it’s settled.” Among those joining Warburton on the long-promised review is Brian Fisher, former head of the agricultural research bureau Abare and a leading climate change modeller who repeatedly warned about the potential economic impacts of the carbon tax before it was legislated. The result of the 5 April election for six WA senators could potentially change the make-up of the crossbench votes on which the Abbott government will rely to gain passage of key legislation, including the carbon and mining tax repeal – as well as changes to the RET. If a new WA election resulted in the more usual breakdown of three Liberals, two Labor and one Green, or two Liberals, two Labor, one Green and one PUP or conservative-leaning independent, it would mean the government could expect three votes in favour of most of its proposals and three against. That would make the balance of power in the new Senate a much more fluid proposition, possibly reduce the power of the PUP and put Xenophon and the Democratic Labour party senator John Madigan back in the Senate balance-of-power mix. |