On gas:

Q: I want to go to one of the major announcements in your speech this evening, which is about gas. Obviously, a highly contested but very important area for the Australian economy. You’ve announced a national gas plan, introducing gas reservation for the east coast, as we just saw, 10-20% of east coast gas from new fields and a price. You’ve named that price. Whether will we see gas at $10 a gigajoule?

Dutton:

We think by the end of the year is about the timing.

Q: By the end of this year?

Dutton:

Correct, of this calendar year, and that’s something we’ve been working on with key figures in the gas industry, and we’ve been doing months literally of work in relation to how this will work because I think it’s transformative for the economy and, as we know, energy is the economy, and it allows us not just for consumers but for businesses, for manufacturers, for food manufacturers, for farmers, etc, to reap a benefit from lower input costs and it’s just about gas per se, of course, gas is such an integral part of electricity production and that is how we can help some of the price pressures in the economy.

Q: Let’s get a few things clear about this. Are we talking about a gas reservation policy that applies to existing gas projects or only new gas projects?

Dutton:

So probably the most succinct way to explain it is that we honour our foundation contracts so with our international partners and that’s important because it is a big export earner for us. But the gas that’s sold beyond that we want to divert between, you know, 50-100 petajoules back into the market and that will fluctuate depending on the domestic need at the time and it will increase supply. We don’t want to temper demand.

I mean the Labor Party is tempering demand by closing down businesses and manufacturers who are moved offshore.

Q: I want to be absolutely clear about that.

Dutton:

Sure, so it’s gas in the market now and our pledge is to bring more gas on more quickly and we’ve announced, obviously, in relation to the west coast, the market there, that we will extend the life of the important project there which the Labor Party is refusing to do.

Q: But no breaching of existing contracts in relation to our international. partners

Dutton:

No breaching of existing contracts.