Now and then: Liberals caught out on large scale solar

The Canberra Liberals have highlighted their hypocrisy on renewable energy policy and have been caught out in their opposition to Labor's large scale generation proposal today, Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development, Simon Corbell said.

Mr Corbell said it has been revealed, the Canberra Liberals proposed the development of a solar power station as the "cornerstone" of their 2008 election Climate Change policy.

In a policy document dated 10 October 2008, just days before the 2008 Election, Zed Seselja committed the Liberal Party to:

" The immediate commencement of a project to develop of (sic) Solar Power Plant at the heart of a Renewable Energy Park." (p.1, Cleaning up our ACT - Leadership on Climate Change policy document)

Mr Seselja now says that the Canberra Liberals will not support Large Scale Solar legislation because:

"... this large scale solar scheme is an expensive way to achieve nothing at all..." (Media Release ‘Latest Solar Scheme an expensive way to do nothing'6 December 2011)

Yet Mr Seselja comments today, are contradicted in the same policy document from October 2008 where the Liberals said:

"Our vision is to establish a renewable energy centre of excellence - the ACT Renewable Energy Park - with a large scale solar power plant at its heart.

"A Canberra Liberal Government would partner with leaders in the field to support the development of a solar power plant, preferably base load plant, which would provide renewable energy for a substantial proportion of Canberra's energy needs."(Page 7 "Cleaning up our ACT, Leadership on Climate Change" Canberra Liberals 10 October 2011)

"In 2008 the Canberra Liberals supported large scale solar as the "cornerstone" of their climate change policy, with plans to develop a large scale base load plant to power thousands and thousands of Canberra homes," Mr Corbell said.

"Today the Liberals voted in the Legislative Assembly against Labor's plan to deliver large scale solar and make Canberra the Solar Capital of Australia.

"It is clear that only the Labor Government has the commitment and policy responses to deliver large scale solar for our community, in contrast the Liberals only have hypocrisy and political opportunism."