Peter Dutton ‘torpedoing his credibility’ as Labor latches on to rogue figure in power bill fight

The Albanese Government claims Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is “torpedoing his own credibility” in the latest round of the political fight over Australia’s energy future.

As the Coalition pledged to bring down power bills within their first term of Government — with a new gas strategy to be announced before the election — Labor have continued to pick holes in the Opposition’s policy.

The Coalition released long-awaited modelling by Frontier Economics on Friday, which claim building nuclear power plants across the country, firmed up by gas and renewables, would cost the taxpayer 44 per cent less by 2050 than Labor’s renewables-focused policy.

Frontier says the Coalition’s policy would cost $263 billion less than Labor’s trajectory, relying on the assumption that under the Opposition, Australia would need less power in 2050 than the Government has projected.

The capital cost of building seven nuclear reactors across the country would be $120 billion, shadow treasurer Angus Taylor later confirmed.

Mr Dutton says this cost would trickle down to cheaper power bills, but in unveiling his policy on Friday and again in a press conference on Tuesday he declined to put a figure on how much Australians would benefit.

Frontier Economics themselves said in the report they did not model future prices, but on Tuesday Mr Dutton asserted the analysis had modelled “that over time electricity prices will be 44 per cent cheaper under our policy than Labor’s”.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers was quick to jump on what he claimed was “worse than a gaffe and worse than a lie”.

“Frontier didn’t provide any modelling on electricity prices,” he said, quoting from their report when he said “we do not at this stage present any results for the prices”.

“Peter Dutton is either lying or he has no idea about his own policy, or both…. It completely torpedoes his credibility.

“Peter Dutton’s nuclear fantasy will push electricity prices up, not down.”

He referred to economic analysis done by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis that found nuclear energy could increase bills by up to $1200.

Mr Dutton on Tuesday when asked why Frontier didn’t model the impact nuclear would have on power bills said nuclear was “cheaper electricity” because of cost amortisation.

“You spread the cost out over a 60 to 80 year period, and probably closer to a century with the technology developments that we’re seeing,” he said.

The oldest functioning nuclear reactor is just over 50 years old.

In order to keep power bills low in the short term, both Mr Dutton and Nationals Leader David Littleproud on Tuesday said gas would be crucial.

“There’s lots of gas required. We’ve spoken about discovering more fields, and we’re strongly supportive of condensing the timelines,” Mr Dutton said.

A new gas strategy is “exactly what we’ll be announcing” before the election, which will put downward pressure on bills, Mr Littleproud said.

“When you look at it in a commonsense way, the only way that you can reduce bills is to increase supply and the only way you can do that quickly, is to bring on gas and bring gas on quickly into the market,” Mr Littleproud told Sky.

The Government’s attack on Mr Dutton’s power price claim came as Dr Chalmers claimed the Coalition’s energy policy would stymie economic output by $4 trillion over the next 25 years.

Frontier’s modelling is based on the assumption that Australia’s 2050 electricity grid is 40 per cent smaller than the Government’s plan, which predicts the country will be almost entirely powered by renewables.

The Government says under its plan, the economy would grow at 2.12 per cent a year, while under the Coalition assumes a lower 1.89 per cent annual GDP.

Ovre the next 25 years, the growth differences would amount to trillions of dollars in lost output.

“What you’re talking about is the growth sacrificed under the numbers provided by the Coalition. That (figure) is based on the low growth scenario in the work that has been done,” Dr Chalmers said.

“The economy and those numbers are $294 billion smaller in 2050, the cumulative loss output between now and mid-century is $4 trillion... Those are numbers that come from the scenario they adopted.

“What they’re proposing is less industry and higher energy prices. This is the economic and fiscal absurdity of that trash that they put up at the end of last week.”

Mr Dutton said the Government’s figures were “comical”.