Energy

Monash Forum sets up dinner with Trevor St Baker as business tells Labor to stick with national energy guarantee

The pro-coal Monash Forum is attempting to convene a private dinner when federal parliament resumes in mid-October with Trevor St Baker, part-owner of the Vales Point coal generator and founder of the business electricity retailer ERM Power.
With the energy minister, Angus Taylor, working up options for cabinet to lower power prices and boost generation capacity by expanding existing plants, upgrading ageing legacy generators and pursuing new investments, the Coalition’s pro-coal ginger group has scheduled dinner with St Baker in Parliament House on 16 October.
According to an invitation circulated among members of the Monash Forum, seen by Guardian Australia, Coalition MPs will meet for dinner and discussion on “Australia’s energy future”.
St Baker has previously signalled interest in pursuing a replacement for the Hazelwood power station if the federal government settles on a favourable energy policy, and members of the Monash Forum want the businessman to update them about his investment plans.
Planning for the soiree comes as industry associations and energy associations met in Canberra on Thursday with the shadow climate change minister, Mark Butler, and the Labor leader, Bill Shorten, and urged them to persist with the national energy guarantee.
Malcolm Turnbull, as one of his last acts in the top job, dumped the policy after an internal, conservative-led insurgency. The new prime minister, Scott Morrison, and his cabinet have now taken a formal decision to dump the emissions reduction component of the Neg.

Trevor St Baker, right
Trevor St Baker, right, part-owner of the Vales Point coal generator and founder of the business electricity retailer ERM Power. Photograph: Patrick Hamilton/PR IMAGE

Before the policy was junked, the Turnbull government and the then energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, spent months lining up stakeholders to support the policy, which was designed by the Energy Security Board.
Business groups and energy associations are dismayed by the abandonment of the policy because they fear there is now no clear investment signal to guide investment in generation assets with 30 and 40-year operating lives. The groups sent a clear message to Labor that the current mess needed to be resolved.
According to people present at the meeting, the groups made the case that Labor should persist with the Neg rather than junking it and pursuing a brand new policy for the electricity sector.
In his opening remarks to the meeting, Butler said Labor had heeded the message from industry players that reaching a bipartisan consensus was important, so Labor had attempted to be constructive when the Turnbull government brought forward various policy options, culminating in the Neg.
Butler said there was always going to be a difference between Labor and the Coalition on the level of ambition of emissions reduction but he said “getting the rules agreed upon would have been a monumental step forward in resolving the energy crisis and set us up for the investment and jobs that we need over coming years that will start to clean up our energy sector and bring power prices down”.
He told the groups Labor understood there was strong buy-in from stakeholders for the Neg, and Labor wanted “to make sure that good thinking is not entirely lost”.
“We want to make sure the energy policy we put forward at the next election is the most compelling policy that we can possibly come up with from business and household points of view, and we need your help with that,” Butler said.
While Labor is yet to make a final decision, Shorten gave a strong hint at the start of the week that the opposition would keep the Neg as part of a suite of climate policies for the next election. “We are prepared to use that as part of our framework going forward,” he said on Sunday.