{"id":442657,"date":"2010-03-18T03:21:21","date_gmt":"2010-03-18T07:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gordonmoyes.com\/2010\/03\/18\/increasing-electricity-prices-in-nsw\/"},"modified":"2010-03-18T03:21:21","modified_gmt":"2010-03-18T07:21:21","slug":"increasing-electricity-prices-in-nsw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/442657","title":{"rendered":"Increasing electricity prices in NSW"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes:<\/strong> My question without notice is directed to the Minister for Energy. Is the Minister aware that EnergyAustralia, Integral Energy and Country Energy are expected to generate a further $5.3 billion in government earnings between now and 2012-13? Is the Minister aware of the soaring electricity prices that are forcing working families into fuel poverty as they seek an increasing number of payment extensions over their electricity bills in New South Wales? In particular, is the Minister aware that EnergyAustralia has an extra 36,000 customers on bill extension or payment plans, and Integral Energy has 19,000 more customers on assistance schemes? Given the massive profits of the three energy companies and the huge burden of price increases on household budgets, why are working families paying for the New South Wales Government’s lack of investment and maintenance in the States electricity infrastructure and not benefiting from government subsidies in their fuel bills?<\/p>\n

The Hon. John Robertson:<\/strong> The New South Wales Government is deeply concerned about the impact of the proposed price rises and the effect they will have on New South Wales customers. It is important to note that the independent regulator, the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal, sets electricity prices. The Government has made a submission to the tribunal to set the final regulated prices at a level that is no more than required to ensure the ongoing financial viability of the New South Wales standard electricity retailers.<\/p>\n

The Hon. Duncan Gay:<\/strong> What would that do?<\/p>\n

The Hon. John Robertson:<\/strong> As shadow Minister the Hon. Duncan Gay ought to know, and it is probably a reflection on him and his incapacity to understand how the electricity industry works that he would interject with a question like that. If prices are not set at levels that reflect the cost of production, retailers may go broke. More than $272 million in customer assistance is being rolled out over five years to reduce the impact of price increases, including direct financial assistance through rebates and emergency payment vouchers. We have expanded and increased the energy rebate for pensioners plus select health-care cardholders. This rebate now provides $130 a year off electricity bills and will increase in line with inflation from 1 July 2010 and each year thereafter. A new medical energy rebate commenced on 1 January 2010, providing $130 a year to people with medical conditions who need extra heating and cooling at home to stay well, and last year the Government boosted funding for the life-support rebate and added two new machines to the scheme.<\/p>\n

We have also introduced tough new regulations at the beginning of this month that make it harder for energy companies to disconnect customers and require that everyone be afforded two opportunities to pay their bills over a 12-month period. It is important to note that in 2008-09 the rate of electricity disconnections remained unchanged from the previous year at 0.6 per cent. It is worth reinforcing that point—it is 0.6 per cent. More recently, EnergyAustralia has reported a 5 per cent drop in customers being disconnected for non-payment of their electricity account over the past nine months. I assure the House that the New South Wales Government will continue to work hard to reduce the impact of electricity price rises on New South Wales families and small businesses through effective consumer protection measures.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reverend the Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes: My question without notice is directed to the Minister for Energy. Is the Minister aware that EnergyAustralia, Integral Energy and Country Energy are expected to generate a further $5.3 billion in government earnings between now and 2012-13? Is the Minister aware of the soaring electricity prices that are forcing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4129,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-442657","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4129"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442657\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}