Transcript - Interview with Peter Stefanovic, First Edition, Sky News

The Hon Alex Hawke MP
Shadow Minister for Industry and Innovation
Manager of Opposition Business in the House

Topics: Net Zero, Liberal Party.

PETER STEFANOVIC, HOST

Joining us live is the Manager of Opposition Business, Alex Hawke. It's good to see you this morning, Alex. So let's start off for the record. Where do you stand on Net Zero?

ALEX HAWKE
Well, Pete, I've always been on the record for a long time as being very sceptical about the government's ability to arbitrarily say society will do something by a certain date and then force it to try and achieve that. And that's what Net Zero has been. It's a major mistake for the Labor Party to legislate, put into law a target and say we have to meet it by a certain time. The Liberal Party opposed that legislation and we did so because not only will it never be met, but the push from the Labor government to do that means electricity prices just under the Labor government have gone up 40%. This is what the consequence of legislating and trying to force society to do something that it just can't do and all the Labor modelling, all the climate modelling says Labor will never meet these targets. They'll never get there anyway. So trying to force people to do it has an enormous price tag on people and I just saw Julian Hill on your show just before say there's some speed bumps along the way. Well there's some pretty big speed bumps and that includes not just the biggest businesses in the country, as shadow industry minister I've seen the bailouts, it also means pensioners paying a fortune for power, it means households, it means small businesses. There's a lot of speed bumps along the way that Julian Hill refers to and it's the Australian people that are the bumps in the road that he's talking about.

HOST
I mean there's just so many different views on this at the moment Alex, I mean I've been speaking to moderates, I've been speaking to conservatives, I'm just not sure you're all on the same page. So do you think there's going to be consensus achieved this week?

ALEX HAWKE
We’re having a meeting for that purpose. Sussan outlined from the beginning of when she took the leadership, the process, that was to the Nationals and the Liberal Party, we have an energy working group, I'm on that energy working group. Dan Tehan’s doing some great work there. So we're getting to the part of the process now where we will meet as a Liberal Party room and come to a consensus view. In a free-thinking party we're made up of individuals, we have a very different tradition from the Labor Party which is all union members, collectivist thinking, you have to agree by party rules, you're not allowed independent thought, you're not allowed to disagree. We have a different tradition and it can look messier at times but it's important. I respect the intelligence, the capability of all of my colleagues and I respect their right to represent their electorates and put forward their views. That's the process we're undertaking today.

HOST
I'm not sure if you caught it yesterday, Alex, but I spoke to the former member for Menzies, Keith Wolahan, who obviously wants to have another crack at the next election and he told me that by proxy taking out Net Zero is going to be attached or seen as climate denialism and therefore could cost you even more seats at the next election. What's your response to that if Net Zero is taken out?

ALEX HAWKE
Keith and I are on the same page about a lot of things. He was a great member and we hope he returns - I'm sure he's going to come back to Parliament at some point. I think though what he's saying, what he's pointing to is the mood in the community about different things and I get a pretty ambivalent mood from the community, my own electorate and others about whether the government enforcing Net Zero can either achieve it or do it at any cost. I think we're all on a unity ticket that when the Labor government says we'll get Net Zero at any cost to the public, the economy, we're all against that process. It won't work and it's going to cost a fortune. It's going to drive a lot of people out of business and cause living standards to decline, so there's a lot of consensus there. I think, though, that Keith's right about climate denialism. That's not the conversation we're having today. Net Zero is a mechanism, it's something that the international community has come up with. Most countries have adopted it to suit themselves, exempting industries or dealing with it in their own unique way. We can deal with this our own way but having a legislated target, a mandatory target, is proving to be a big mistake.

HOST
But just further to Keith's point though, you take out Net Zero, and I understand all your points that you're making, I mean none of those targets are going to be reached that are issued by the Labor Party but if you take out Net Zero it could well be seen by a vast swathe of increasingly younger voters who believe in climate change and who want action taken on that. How do you convince them to vote for you?

ALEX HAWKE
Well climate isn't the only issue. Most young people are more exercised about housing affordability and renting affordability than they are about climate right now and for good reasons. One of the reasons housing has gone up is climate policy as well. The mad push to sort of increase the cost of every input cost for the construction sector has made the average price of a house go through the roof - just the construction costs before you get to the land and other charges. We really have to be talking to young people about those things, about a strong economy, better technology, these are the future ways to actually reduce emissions and one of the points of difference we showed at the last election, and that we're going to continue to show, in my opinion, is that we're pro-technology like nuclear, future orientated technologies that actually tackle emissions. Other technologies will not do it at scale. Every other country in the world that has adopted nuclear power is reducing their emissions profile. I think young people are very receptive to these messages.

HOST
This is a real test for Susan Lee's leadership this week Alex, is Sussan Ley’s job as Leader safe?

ALEX HAWKE
Absolutely. I think there's been a lot of commentary on commentary. Colleagues are all-minded to discuss Net Zero and get to a consistent position on climate and have a Coalition with the Nationals. There's virtually no divergence of view on that. And while I think there's been an obsession in the media about leadership - this happens in Opposition - it has happened in many of the terms I've been in Opposition before, it's happening again, but no one's raising it internally.

HOST
No one's raising it internally. I mean, Sarah Henderson mentioned last week that people were privately. Is that not true?

ALEX HAWKE
Well, look, I didn't hear her say that, what you've just said. She obviously made a public comment. My view has always been that whomever you elect to lead the Liberal Party, whether you disagree with some of their policy, whether you're happy with where you are in the system, that they're our Leader and you've got to support them publicly and you must do that. And it's not just required, but it's also the right thing to do because it's a pretty tough job being Opposition Leader, whatever the politics are, and every day is pretty hard. Leaders don't need it to be harder by anyone sort of saying publicly things about them while they're doing that on our behalf. The Liberal Leader has to take up a whole set of arguments every day that are very difficult and we support them in doing that.

HOST
Okay, we are out of time but Alex Hawke, appreciate your time this morning.

ENDS