Eric Abetz handed senior Tasmanian cabinet roles – as it happened

Jeff Dimery also commented on how confident he is in the target of net zero by 2050:

If I steal the line of others in the industry, and some commentators: this transition has been described as akin to a post-war reconstruction effort, and it is true…. It is a monumental task and I am not hearing anybody downplay the magnitude of that.

Does that mean we won’t get there? I think it is challenging, as I said. Would I stand here today in 2024 looking out to 2050 and tell you something can’t be done? No, I wouldn’t. But I can tell you that absent some significant changes along the way, we will struggle.

At the press club, Jeff Dimery has been taking more questions around nuclear energy.

Moderator Jane Norman notes the full details of Coalition policy is not yet known, but reporting suggests they are seeking to replace existing coal-fired power stations with nuclear.

As a company that owns a coal-fired power station, does Dimery believe nuclear reactors could be built quickly enough to replace the capacity of outgoing coal-fired power stations?

He responds:

From a replacement timeframe point of view, as I pointed out I am 55, if you add 10 years, that will get us to 2034, and there will still be coal in the market in 2034. AGL’s timetable is 2035, and [even AEMO is saying] there will be coal in 2038.

It’s not something we have turned our mind to but based on what I have read, could you, if you started now, have nuclear in the market by 2035 or 2038? The answer would be yes. But again, no-one is starting now because the legislation isn’t conducive to us even exploring that. Again, it is kind of like looking for unicorns in the garden.

Several staff members stood aside at Australian College of Nursing pending investigation

Several staff members have stood aside from their roles at The Australian College of Nursing pending an investigation into “potential financial irregularities” at the college.

The ABC has named those staff members as ACN’s high-profile CEO Kylie Ward, along with COO Neil Haynes and national partnerships director Karoline Dawe.

The board of the ACN said there was currently insufficient evidence to determine the nature of the potential irregularities, but believed they should be investigated by third-party legal and forensic financial experts.

The board said in a statement:

No conclusions should be drawn at this time.

To ensure due process is followed and to assist an efficient investigation, it is appropriate that certain staff members have stepped aside pending the outcome of the investigation. The Board stresses that this is an investigation only and is not at this stage alleging that any of the people who have stepped aside are responsible for any financial irregularities.

The Australian College of Nursing is a not-for-profit body with 150,000 that supports continuing education, advocacy and training for nurses across the country. In the last financial year, the revenue of the college was $22.9m, according to the latest financial report.

Ward, Haynes and Dawe were contacted for comment.

Q: The consensus on renewables is slightly more together, but again we are seeing a lack of bipartisan support for what Australia’s energy future looks like. How much is that holding back renewable investment for Australia?

Jeff Dimery said one pleasing factor is that both major parties are committed to net zero by 2050, with the concept of “climate deniers hopefully [now] off the table” and the debate shifting to what is the best way to achieve this shared goal.

Clearly the Liberal-National Party looking at the replacement of baseload coal, with baseload nuclear [while] the current government is more focused around the technologies that are there today.

Minister [for climate change Chris] Bowen has a very very difficult job as does the head of AEMO, and you will see the changes in the composition of the energy mix year on year, as these ISPs are released, and so the best we can do right now from my perspective is keep ploughing on with what we know and what we have got.

We are all on the same page, that is an outcome we are shooting for. The big debate is about how quickly we get there. What would you pay to be there a day early, and what would you be prepared to save to be there a day late? That is really what we are talking about now. And that is very refreshing from where we were, four or five years ago, where we were not even on the same page.

‘Nuclear a political question politicians need to resolve’, energy boss says

Taking questions from reporters, Jeff Dimery is asked about the federal opposition’s position on nuclear energy.

Specifically, he was whether there would be community acceptance of nuclear reactors in the La Trobe Valley, where he works.

Dimery responded:

The short answer is I’m not sure, we have not polled them. We care very much about our workers and our workforce and I think it’s incumbent upon us and upon governments to make sure we have a just transition plan for when we do close.

The broader issue of nuclear: it’s a question we are getting a bit more lately. My view is nuclear is a political question, and it’s something the folks up on the hill really need to resolve.

And what I mean is I am 55 years old. The ability to develop nuclear in this country is not legislated, it is not legal at this point, and I would imagine there is a lengthy process to go through to get it to that point.

Then there is a lengthy process to go through with development and construction, in which time I will be retired. So it’s probably for the younger folks to debate [but what] I would say, you can imagine our shareholder and board would not be too impressed of the management team if it were sitting around contemplating building power stations that are not legal, it would not be a great use of our time.

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Australians will have to ‘pay more for energy in future’ as part of renewables transition, says Alinta Energy CEO

Back at the National Press Club, Alinta Energy CEO Jeff Dimery argues a hard truth of the transition to renewables means “Australians also have to pay more for energy in the future”.

We will spend more as a percentage of GDP on energy, energy services, and energy infrastructure. Whether we pay through the tax base, or pay the large upfront cost of an EV, or batteries and solar, or we’re paying more for electricity from the grid, we will all pay more in aggregate. We need to be honest about that. I don’t think the average Australian is prepared for that reality.

Capital costs more. Labour costs more. Transmission costs are rising. There are going to be alternatives. Electricity might cost more, but your petrol bill might disappear. If we’re prepared to change behaviour and use most of our energy within certain windows, you will be able to have greater bill control. Getting over the hump of this difficult part of the transition is going to require partnerships in all directions.

He said Australia has a “real opportunity” to leverage renewables and firm economic security, and said governments need to “maintain clear public policy” and not get “distracted” with new ideas “without a firm social mandate”.

We know what energy mix we need to blend together today. We just need to get on with it.

So let’s take stock of what the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, said in that press conference about an issue that has sparked a round of political debate and some strong reactions overnight:

Albanese insisted that “nothing has changed in our position” regarding a two-state solution in the Middle East, after Penny Wong last night said recognition of a Palestinian state was the only way to end the cycle of violence in the Middle East in the long term.

In a clear pushback at the Coalition’s denunciations overnight, Albanese noted that a two-state solution was “a stated position of past Australian governments as well”.

Albanese basically said that there was nothing new in Australia expressing the view that Israelis and Palestinians should “be able to live in peace and security with stability and to be able to prosper in the future in a region which is peaceful”.

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But Albanese was notably vague on the timing of potential recognition. Asked specifically whether he was willing to recognise a Palestinian state while Hamas was still in control in Gaza, Albanese fell back on the process line that “we are working with like-minded partners as well to say that Hamas has no role in a future Palestinian state”.

Albanese reiterated that “every innocent life matters, whether they be Israeli or Palestinian” and he repeated Australia’s call for the immediate release of all hostages held by Hamas (the Coalition has been claiming that the government has gone relatively silent on calling for hostages, even though ministers have repeated the call on almost every occasion they have been asked).

And in a further defence of Wong’s speech, Albanese noted that her comments were very similar to the position outlined by the UK’s foreign secretary, David Cameron. This was pushback at the idea that Australia was acting out in front of its allies.

We’ll go now to Canberra where managing director and CEO of Alinta Energy, Jeff Dimery, has been speaking at the National Press Club.

He noted Aemo says a true transformation of the national electricity market will require “levels of investment in generation, storage transmission and system services that exceed all previous efforts combined”. So what is stopping more private companies investing in renewables?

Dimery said:

I mentioned retail margins are relatively low … If it’s not an industry flush with profits, then how can it invest in new generation? Not on the scale required for transition in any event, and despite the profits reported in the last financial year, the investment outlook for large scale renewables is challenging. Let me tell you why. Higher costs and uncertainty about recovering them, that’s why …

When I sat down to write this speech, the future Victorian energy price for the 2026 calendar year was $58 a megawatt hour. In 2026, we will still have plenty of brown coal in the system, producing round-the-clock baseload energy. It will be topped up by a decent amount of large scale renewables and rooftop PV.

That’s great, but at $58, I can’t build anything to meaningfully prepare for coal to come out of the system. I can’t build more solar because we have a solar glut in the middle of the day, sending spot prices deeply negative.

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Eyewear retailer behind OPSM, Oakley and Sunglass Hut fined for spam messages

Eyewear retailer Luxottica has been fined over $1.5m for sending over 200,000 marketing messages in breach of Australian spam law.

The company behind OPSM, Oakley and Sunglass Hut was found by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (Acma) to have sent 91,231 marketing emails without an unsubscribe function, and 112,348 texts and emails from customers who had previously unsubscribed.

The messages were sent between November 2022 and May 2023.

Acma member Samantha Yorke said:

Businesses must keep up their side of the bargain and stop sending these messages when customers ask them to.

Acma noted around half of the emails without the unsubscribe link were order confirmations or password reset emails that contained commercial content such as how to buy products.

Acma has been on a blitz against companies over spam act breaches, with fines issued to companies including Uber, Outdoor Supacentre and Kmart in recent months. Over the past 18 months, businesses have been fined over $12.7m for spam and telemarketing failures.

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‘Nothing has changed in our position’ of Hamas having ‘no role in future Palestinian state’: Albanese

Q: Are you willing to recognise a Palestinian state while Hamas is still in control?

Anthony Albanese:

We have said very clearly that we want a two-state solution [and] we are working with like-minded partners as well to say that. Hamas has no role in a future Palestinian state.

Albanese also responded to criticism that recognising a Palestinian state at this time would be viewed as a reward for Hamas:

We have had a long-term position of support for a two-state solution in the Middle East. Nothing has changed in our position there …

We have said every innocent life matters, whether they be Israeli or Palestinian. We have unequivocally opposed the actions of Hamas on 7 October as the actions of a terrorist organisation. That organisation is outlawed for good reason and we have called for the immediate release of all hostages which have been held by Hamas. We have done that consistently.