Victory: MB forces ACCC to back gas reservation

Hope is kindled:

Welcome aboard, Rod. This will aid Labor to tackle the gas cartel when it takes power. It must do it first and foremost or as falling house prices drag down the AUD then we’ll see a new gas and electricity price shock smash into the economy. It will be made even worse if we get LNG imports. The opposition will blame Labor’s commitment to renewables and it will be political chaos all over again.

Conversely, if the cartel is broken with reservation, LNG imports are prevented, and the gas price lowered to $6-8Gj then utility prices will crater and income will flood back into business and household pockets across the east coast while decarbonisation can proceed smoothly.

It’s a complete policy no-brainer using the Coalition’s own policy mechanism.


  1. How will he balls it up though?

    He was instrumental in destroying internet competition via the 121 POI decision – that made smaller NBN ISPs uneconomic and caused mass consolidation.

    • It won’t be him who balls it up …. our morons in power will do that. Labor will attempt to tackle it, get overwhelmed because they lack the guile and the backbone (like all of our politicians and their parties) and end up delivering a stinking half-way house that is shiny new on one side and rotting on the other.

    • The smaller ISP will eventually disappear regardless of the number of POI, because it’ll eventually be a combined service including mobile phone data and wired, and there are only 3 mobile phone in Australia. The POI however hasten this up by about a decade.

      The bigger issue now is Telstra saying they want to buy NBN. If the ACCC approves, that would be utter disaster for internet in Australia.

  2. “Welcome aboard, Rod. This will aid Labor …” careful mate, you don’t want to create any semblance of suggestion that any action by a regulator might be to any extent partisan.

    Seriously, that would be the worst poison imaginable if it is seized upon by anyone.

  3. MB was the lone voice saying we needs gas reservation in Australian media for a long, long time, and it’s good to see it has finally latched on. Mind you, this should be a “no-brainer” for any regulator, and it shouldn’t take a few years of witnessing the bleeding obvious to turn things around.

  4. This issue has become and INTERNATIONAL EMBARRASSMENT …. I had discussions with employee of the US DOE earlier this week, and this very issue is viewed in the USA as a text-book National energy (non) policy F#ck-up that other nations should study, and learn all about, in order not to repeat to such an incredible extent!! WOW! #Straya #incredible

      • The views were expressed as the DOE employees own personal views, and if I were to share much more about our discussions, that were in a group forum involving 100 Energy industry professionals, I’d no doubt reveal their identity and personal views, which would not be fair.

        There are some parallels to be drawn, especially around timing, between the Aus East coast LNG market commencing exports and that of the USA LNG export market. Any similarities between the two (obviously) tend to stop at timing however.

        The key point of embarrassment remains that our federal government has permitted 26 million tonnes per annum of LNG to leave the East coast of Australia at the same time that shortfalls of domestic gas supply have resulted in price spikes that are in effect crippling our nation’s economy. This is economic mismanagement at the federal level, in truly epic proportions that is present now and who’s impacts will be long-lived into the future.

      • This is just like the 1840s Irish Potato Famine:
        During the Famine, Ireland produced enough food, flax, and wool to feed and clothe double its nine million people.[29] When Ireland had experienced a famine in 1782–83, ports were closed to keep Irish-grown food in Ireland to feed the Irish. Local food prices promptly dropped. Merchants lobbied against the export ban, but Grattan's Parliament, exercising the short lived powers within the Constitution of 1782, overrode their protests. There was no such export ban in the 1840s.[30] Some historians[31][32] have argued that in this sense the famine was artificial, caused by the British government's choice not to stop exports.[29]

        History sure does rhyme. Just insert “gas” for “food”….

  5. All Rod Sims mentioned was reservation similar to that which has already happened in Qld? The crazy MB policy of retrospective reservation wasn’t mentioned.