On 21 August I joined the Premier and the Minister for Energy and Resources in Portland, where the Premier hit the reset button on renewable energy investment in Victoria.
The Premier announced the Labor government’s Renewable Energy Roadmap, which includes a target of no less than 20 per cent renewable energy by 2020, and if there can be more, there will be; the creation of more than 1000 jobs in regional Victoria through the new $20 million New Energy Jobs Fund; and an initiative to source renewable energy certificates from new projects in Victoria, bringing forward around $200 million of new investment in renewables.
Renewable energy equals jobs. That is why the Andrews Labor government itself has used its buying power to invest in renewable energy and invest in Victorian jobs. Portland’s Keppel Prince is a prime example of that.
Under the current federal Liberal government and the previous state coalition government, Keppel Prince laid off almost its entire workforce because of the Liberal-Nationals government’s flat-earth approach to renewable energy. This approach has cost Victoria thousands of jobs and tens of millions of dollars in investment, and Victorian Labor will not stand for it.
Under Labor, the jobs are coming back. We are seeing news headlines such as ‘Wind jobs boom’ and ’40 new jobs at Keppel Prince’.
Mr Ramsay interjected.
Ms TIERNEY — I say to Mr Ramsay that the latter headline was on the front page of last Monday’s Portland Observer. There are many more jobs to come for Keppel Prince and the Portland community, Keppel Prince having won the tender to build wind towers for the Ararat wind farm.