Ed Husic has demanded strong action to end “profiteering” among gas exporters and to force them to sell cheaper fuel for Australian use, as the former industry minister broke ranks with his Labor colleagues to support an independent MP’s motion regarding energy prices on the east coast.
In a stinging rebuke to what he called Australia’s “timid” approach to gas market regulation, Husic delivered an impassioned speech in parliament where he said “tinkering at the edges” of reform would not fix a “fundamentally distorted” gas market.
“We do not have a gas supply problem, we have a gas export problem,” Nicole Boele said.
Husic said higher prices and uncertain supply for domestic use was “not because we don’t have enough gas, but because the gas that comes from beneath Australian soil is prioritised for customers offshore rather than customers onshore”.
Australia exports three-quarters of the gas it produces, and the energy regulator has warned of an east coast gas shortfall by the winter of 2028.
“Over decades, governments have entrenched this, largely by inaction, hoping the problem would go away,” Husic said.
“Our gas, our prices: that should be the bedrock of our thinking.
“The cost of doing business in this country for multinational gas firms is that they must provide a gas price in line with historic pre-pandemic levels, and this should apply to any new field that’s opened too.
