SUBJECTS: Travel in and out of Australia; oil, gas & coal; energy; renewables; quarantine; borders; Aussies stranded overseas.
 
DAVID BEVAN, HOST: Let’s welcome to the program Anthony Albanese, Leader of the Opposition. Good morning to you, sir. 
 
ANTHONY ALBANESE, LEADER OF THE AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY: Good morning, David. Good to be with you again.
 
BEVAN: And good to talk to you. Anthony Albanese, before we get on to big matters, talking about gas and energy and things like that, can I ask you for your thoughts on an ABC Adelaide Radio listener, and that is Judith. You are aware of Judith’s story. For people who weren’t listening earlier in the week, she rang in and said, ‘I want to go back to Ireland. My mum is there, and she is 104 years old. I accept that if I go, I might not be able to get back.’ And the Federal Government has said no. This seems extraordinary. What do you think, Anthony Albanese?
 
ALBANESE: I think it is beyond belief that a Government could think that it's within its rights to say no to a woman wanting to see her mum who's 104 years old. This is quite extraordinary. As I understand it, her brother has been given permission to travel. And a bit of common sense surely should apply here. We understand that there are restrictions. We need to keep Australians safe. But this is someone leaving the country. The issue of them coming back, of course, I think that she understands that might be difficult. But the idea we stop people leaving to see their 104-year-old mother, let's hope she's around for a long time, but it is not going to be indefinite. And so sometimes I just shake my head at this Government.
 
BEVAN: Particularly because we know some businesspeople are going overseas. We know sports people are going overseas. We're going to send people to the Olympics in a few weeks' time. 
 
ALBANESE: Matthias Cormann could go overseas to apply for a job. And we supported him in that job. But he used the Royal Australian Air Force jet to bounce around European capitals and to lobby for a job interview. That's a private job, by the way. It's not like he's representing the Australian Government. He was nominated by the Australian Government, but it is a private job in his own capacity. He has to represent everyone once he takes up the job in the OECD. And yet here is a woman wanting to visit her mum and has been told she's not allowed to do so. I think some of the decisions this Government has made don't make sense, the way that they've handled quarantine with failing to set up an appropriate quarantine regime here in Australia that they're clearly responsible for. The fact of all those stranded people in India but right around the country. Of course, we have more than 30,000 Australians stranded overseas. The Prime Minister said he'd have them home by Christmas. And clearly, he has not delivered that. Far from it. 
 
BEVAN: Anthony Albanese, the Federal Coalition Government is committed to building and funding a new gas-fired power station. Do you think this is a good idea?
 
ALBANESE: What's important here is what the science tells us and what the economists tell us. And they tell us that this doesn't stack up. Otherwise, the market would have put this mechanism in place. This is $600 million of taxpayers' money for a project that will produce 10 permanent jobs. 10 jobs $600 million. And AEMO, the Australian Energy Market Operator, people like Kerry Schott, who I have a great deal of respect for, she was appointed by the current Government to provide advice on energy security, she says this is not a good idea. So I'm very sceptical. And the Government has to, at the very least, if they want to convince people that this is the right thing, then what they should do is release the business case for this project.
 
BEVAN: Meryl Swanson, Labor MP who holds the seat of Paterson in which the power station will be built, has said she would welcome the 600 construction jobs the project would create but also the security it would give to the Tomago Aluminium Smelter. So your own MP who represents this area thinks it's a good idea.
 
ALBANESE: And the point is that the local member is supporting funding in their local community. There's 150 MPs in the House of Representatives. And I think you would struggle to find one who would say, 'No, don't spend taxpayer money in my electorate'. That's fair enough. Meryl is sticking up for her community. And that's fine. There's nothing surprising in that. 
 
BEVAN: But does that mean that Anthony Albanese is not sticking up for people in her community?
 
ALBANESE: No, it means I'm standing up for the national interest, which is my job. And I'm saying if the Federal Government have a case for this, they should publish it, publish what it is. It's not complicated. They need to put out there very clearly what the business case is. Because you have all of these experts, the Australian Energy Market Operator, the New South Wales Government, the other private sector operators in the energy market. And the problem here is that this has been so compromised by the Government's actions that we don't have an energy policy in this country. We've had 22 attempts to have an energy policy under this Government and they haven't landed any of them. And that's why I think people in the sector are so frustrated that something is holding back private sector investment and capital being expended to boost our economy. The Government is part of the problem rather than part of the solution. 
 
BEVAN: Do you think that Australia should follow the advice of the International Energy Agency and end new investments in oil, gas, and coal?
 
ALBANESE: No, well, I think they are decisions for the market to operate. What the role of government here, and that's the difficulty that we get into with this intervention by the Federal Government, the role of the Federal Government should be to set the policy framework, the parameters of where we're trying to hit in terms of reducing emissions, establish that, which the Government under Malcolm Turnbull tried to a little bit of the way with the NEG, the guarantee that was going to be put in place that they backed away from. But since then, we haven't seen a policy framework. That's the appropriate thing. I don't think it's the role of government to say, 'No, you can't do that'. What it is, is to establish appropriate economic settings so that the investment goes to the lowest cost, most effective, best form of new energy generation. That's the way to go forward. That's the way that you change the makeup of our energy grid.
 
BEVAN: Should the Federal Government make the policy settings such that the market will not invest in oil, gas and coal?
 
ALBANESE: No, the Federal Government should set an appropriate market, not based upon making decisions based upon good or bad. What we know is that it should be based upon emissions. The market is moving. So some of this debate is, quite frankly, becoming redundant.
 
BEVAN: It shouldn't be based on good and bad. But isn't that the point here? People say emissions are bad.
 
ALBANESE: It should be based upon lower emissions. 
 
BEVAN: In that case, wouldn't you set the market so that that if emissions are bad, you set the market so that you can't have new investment in oil, gas and coal? 
 
ALBANESE: And guess what, David? Name the number of new coal-fired power plants that have been built this century.
 
BEVAN: But we're talking about gas.
 
ALBANESE: It is really easy. It's really easy, because the answer is zero. 
 
BEVAN: But you can put up as many gas and an oil power stations?
 
ALBANESE: The market is working there too, David. What's happening is that the entire trend is towards renewables with batteries. That's what's happening. So in spite of the Government's efforts to undermine and to not have an energy policy, the market is speaking, it's going to the least cost, most effective form of new energy. We have the absurdity of the Federal Government funding, to the tune of a few million dollars, a feasibility study for the proponent of a new coal-fired power station in North Queensland. Everyone knows it's not going to happen. Everyone knows it's not going to go ahead. And yet the money is being expended there. What we need to do is to actually recognise that when it comes to energy, the market is a very effective method of going to least cost, most effective outcomes. And that overwhelmingly is renewables. There is a role for gas. Absolutely. There is a role for gas in terms of firming and in terms of capacity, some projects, absolutely. But what is happening overwhelmingly is a shift to renewables, just as people are voting with their roofs in Australia better than any other country. What we also need to do is to make sure that we don't get in this circumstance whereby we're trying to pretend that that's not the case and intervening to distort the market in favour of higher emissions production.
 
BEVAN: Just before you leave us, David wants to take us back to the borders and people traveling overseas. David, you've got a question for Anthony Albanese.
 
DAVID, CALLER: Hi, David. Hi, Anthony. I am a Labor voter but am one that also is probably concerned about border security during the pandemic. My question is this, if someone, like a sports person or someone voluntarily going overseas for a wedding or a funeral, if they go overseas during the pandemic, should they be at the front of the queue to come back, jumping ahead of people who've been stuck overseas? Or should they then be at the back of the queue?
 
ALBANESE: Well, there isn't a queue, that's the problem. There isn't a queue. There's 9,000 people stranded in India. Some of them have been there for some 18 months. The Government said it would bring people home by Christmas. And it is possible to bring people home. We brought Australians home from Wuhan at the very beginning of the outbreak. We were able to achieve that. And yet not only have we not been able to bring people home from places like India, we've actually threatened with jail, Australian citizens, if they tried to come home. And I think people will look at the other travel, both out and in, people who have been able to get back, and they will see that there's an inequity there. And the truth is that there's, as well, we know some of them might have been brought home but there's still a large majority of the 170 odd unaccompanied children who need to be brought home. I would have thought that was an absolute priority. 
 
BEVAN: Anthony Albanese, thanks for your time.
 
ALBANESE: Thanks very much. 
 
BEVAN: Anthony Albanese, Leader of the Federal Opposition.
 
ENDS