Mr PETER DEBNAM(Vaucluse) [4.05 p.m.]: One has to ask: Who wrote that speech? Another new member of Parliament takes a speech written by some bureaucrat in the background, or by Walt Secord, and reads it out. He was a police prosecutor. Did he ever do is own work or did he just reads this rubbish?

Mr PETER DEBNAM: One has to ask: Who wrote that speech? Another new member of Parliament takes a speech written by some bureaucrat in the background, or by Walt Secord, and reads it out. He was a police prosecutor. Did he ever do is own work or did he just reads this rubbish?

Mr Frank Terenzini: Point of order: I can see the member for Vaucluse is getting very excited about this but he should adopt Standing Order 76.

Mr Daryl Maguire: What is it?

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! I ask the member for Maitland to remind me of the terms of Standing Order 76.

Mr Frank Terenzini: It refers to relevance in debate. The member should stick to the point.

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! I have heard enough. There is no point of order. However, I remind the member for Vaucluse to direct his comments through the Chair.

Mr PETER DEBNAM: This debate is about the Minister for Health and the Premier, and it is about the Premier being on the front page. What happens when the Premier is on the front page—you go nuclear. Time and again that is the issue. The member for Maitland made reference to a speech I made in this House in November last year. I said, "Over my dead body. There will not be nuclear in New South Wales." That was a statement from the Coalition last year. I repeated it this year. I think this is a second or third time this year we have discussed this topic. Why? Because Labor members get themselves into a deep hole and try to change the topic. What is the easiest way to do that? Get involved in the Federal election and attack the Prime Minister.

This debate is about Labor in New South Wales being unable to fulfil its responsibilities, whether it comes to climate change or any other portfolio. Here again another new member is given 10 pages to read in Parliament as an apologist for the Labor Party. I made the point to the member for Newcastle the other day that if she continues reading out that rubbish she will be a one-term member. That is what happens to apologists for the New South Wales Labor Party. One member who found that out was Neville Newell.

Mr Frank Terenzini: Point of order: The member for Vaucluse should be told that we are discussing climate change, a very important issue, and he should be relevant.

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! There is no point of order. The member for Vaucluse knows he is entitled to some latitude in this debate, but he should focus on the subject matter of the motion.

Mr PETER DEBNAM: This is all about getting the Premier off the front page by attacking the Prime Minister. It is introducing a new member to the culture of the Labor Party, which is to just read out rubbish in Parliament and become a one-term member. That is what happens to apologists. That is what happened to John Bartlett and what happened to Neville Newell. That is what happens to Labor members who do not represent their communities and simply act as apologists. I suggest the member does his own research. He should look at what I have said about the nuclear debate. We should go back to 1995 when I first moved the motion in this House about the nuclear issue—12 years ago.

I do not know how many times I spoke in this House or in the public arena last year ruling out this proposal. I also spoke on the issue in Parliament a couple of times. Why? Because we have to deal with Labor's political games. Whenever Labor members get into trouble they introduce a red herring and currently they are on the nuclear one. What is the nuclear one all about? It is about John Howard's frustration with Labor doing nothing on climate change. That is what it is all about. One has to understand why the Prime Minister was moved to look at other options. The Prime Minister is very concerned that New South Wales Labor has done nothing on climate change. The Sydney Morning Herald is concerned that Labor has done nothing on climate change. Each week it publishes "The Greenhouse Indicator, New South Wales". For the week ending 19 October it shows 1.835 million tonnes of greenhouse gases.

The Sydney Morning Herald is so concerned that it has given the Government its own page in the newspaper every week and it is publishing the figures for the Government. It is breaking the figures down into petroleum output and coal-fired electricity generation. The Sydney Morning Herald is doing that because, like everyone else, it has looked at what the Government should have done over the last 12 years and what it has not done. Today one of the Ministers talked about ethanol. We had to drag the Government kicking and screaming to adopt a policy on ethanol. I have been driving my car on 85 per cent ethanol since the middle of last year. I have asked the Premier to demand that all his Ministers change their cars to 85 per cent ethanol or to hybrid vehicles, but he is not going to do that. He is only interested in the rorts of office and ensuring that every Labor member of Parliament in this Chamber gets paid additional salaries.

Ms Tanya Gadiel: Point of order: My point of order relates to relevance under Standing Order 129. We have heard about the Machiavellian conspiracies.

Mr Peter Debnam: Tell the member for Maitland it is not Standing Order 76.

Ms Tanya Gadiel: You misled him and that was outrageous. Shame on you!

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: What is the point of order?

Ms Tanya Gadiel: My point of order is relevance. I ask you to direct him back to the subject of the debate.

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! The comments of the member for Vaucluse are within the scope of the debate.

Mr PETER DEBNAM: The Government has done nothing on ethanol. We had to drag Government members kicking and screaming, yet they still resist. They are even back-pedalling on the 10 per cent ethanol.

Ms Marie Andrews: Point of order: The rules of this House clearly indicate that a speaker must address the Chair. For the last five minutes the member for Vaucluse has spoken across the table to Government members, not through the Chair.
 
The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! The member for Vaucluse understands that standing order.

Mr PETER DEBNAM: Mr Deputy-Speaker, I also acknowledge you as a member of the New South Wales Labor Party, so I am talking to the House—to you, indeed, all of you. The fact is that the Government has done nothing about dealing with climate change, which is why the Prime Minister is so frustrated. Let us look at what the Government has done with electricity generation. For three decades Australia has shown leadership and innovation in solar energy yet the Government has done nothing. What has it got to show in terms of renewable solar energy in New South Wales today? Government members do not know, although the member for Coogee might know because he has actually studied this topic.

The fact is they have done nothing in terms of commercially producing solar energy. We have a trial at Liddell of solar thermal on a coal-fired power station, which is a great innovation for a coal-fired power station. Electricity is being generated in solar thermal farms around the world but it is not being done in New South Wales because the Government is not interested. That is why the Sydney Morning Herald has to publish the millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases that the Government pumps out every single week.

What has the Government done about wind farms? When the announcement was made a few weeks ago that there was to be a $2 billion investment in wind farms in New South Wales, the Minister for Energy dismissed that announcement. He was not enthused about that at all; there was not the wind resource in the area. This was a major investmentor in renewable energy, yet the Minister for Energy sought to discourage that announcement. How incredible! The hypocrites in the Labor Party are talking about climate change, yet the Minister for Energy is not interested in renewable energy. I ask Government members to point me to any commercial-scale solar energy in this State that they have encouraged. There is none. Let me turn to public transport. The Government is about to privatise Sydney Ferries, which it has run down. It handed that organisation over to the unions 12 years ago and said, "Go and rake as much money out of that as possible, use any rorts you like." Whenever any general manager of Sydney Ferries tried to do the right thing, the Government sacked them.

Ms Tanya Gadiel: Point of order: The subject matter of the debate is nuclear power and the Kyoto Protocol. The member for Vaucluse should stop talking nonsense and return to the substantive issue. We all know what he would do if he had been the leader, but his mob got rid of him.

The DEPUTY-SPEAKER: Order! I have heard enough. I uphold the point of order.

Mr PETER DEBNAM: This is about politics and climate change. The reason for this debate on nuclear power is because the Prime Minister is totally frustrated with the Government's inability to achieve anything in New South Wales. That is why members such as the member for Coogee stand up and take on their own Government. That is why capable Ministers such as the member for Mount Druitt were thrown off the front bench.