Keeping them Kean
Both sides of politics think they’re onto a winner in the nuclear power fight. But a proper debate over the technology is unlikely to see the light of day.
Anthony Albanese had a chance to start this week redirecting the narrative away from nuclear and towards the ongoing battle with the big supermarkets and costly food prices. After all, the government had just announced it had made it mandatory for grocery giants like Coles and Woolworths to sign up to a code of conduct.
Instead, the prime minister was eager to turn the conversation back to the energy transition. Take his careful comments at his Monday morning press conference in Parliament to announce that in August former NSW Liberal MP Matt Kean would be the next chair of the Climate Change Authority.
“He… understands the folly that walking away from the renewables transition represents for our nation and understands, as a former NSW treasurer, the certainty which the business community need in order to invest make sure that we address not just the challenges but the opportunities that the transition to a clean energy economy represent,” Albanese told reporters in his planned remarks.
As was no doubt intended by the government’s media handlers, questions from journalists immediately turned to the possibilities of nuclear for the transition. Kean responded that as NSW energy minister he considered the “economics and engineering” of nuclear and found it didn’t stack up. This was described in some of the media coverage as delivering "a major blow". That's despite it not being a new position from Kean.
