December 12, 2013
The Electrical Trades Union says the State Government has been “fattening pigs for market”, preparing Stanwell and CS Energy for privatisation.
The union says it will continue campaigning to stop “essential services being sold off to for profit, predominantly to overseas owned companies”.
Responding to this morning’s media release by Treasurer Tim Nicholls, the ETU labelled as “phony” the State Government’s repeated claim that it would not sell off assets without a mandate.
“The government has consistently denied it had any plans to sell electricity assets such as Ergon, Energex and Powerlink – whether through wholesale privatisation or equity sale,” an ETU spokesman said.
“They lied. They have as recently as last week been caught out putting the ‘for sale’ sign up for the wholesale sell-off of Ergon’s forestry assets and ROAMES network, collectively valued at $60 million.”
It said privatisation would mean Queenslanders would end up paying even more for power, on top of recent projected increases.
“Despite the LNP State Government’s abject failure to rein in power prices – a 22.6 per cent increase this year and a further 13.5 per cent due next year – Queensland’s power prices are still cheaper by 18 per cent and 9 per cent respectively than the privatised networks of South Australia and Victoria,” the ETU spokesman said.
“(This is) sending a clear message – if the LNP sells electricity assets…we will all pay more.
“The announcement by the Treasurer today that the LNP State Government will sell assets was planned well before they commissioned former Liberal Treasurer and lobbyist Peter Costello to bring down his discredited Commission of Audit.
“The government has been actively involved in pressuring State-owned electricity entities to reduce their workforce by in excess of 1500 and implement cuts of 10 per cent, which have had devastating impacts on communities like the South Burnett.
“The government has failed to allay fears regarding its plans to close Ergon depots and privatise Ergon’s remote generation, we now know why – these will be outsourced and privatised.
“The government’s actions, service cuts, redundancies and the mothballing of two generation units at Stanwell’s Tarong Power Station were all aimed at fattening the pigs for market.”
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