QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE

Mr BOWEN (McMahon—Minister for Climate Change and Energy) (15:09): 540,211 Australian households have embraced the technology of cheaper home batteries to reduce their bills—in many cases, to nothing—and to help reduce bills for everyone across our energy grid, and 2,326 of those have been in the electorate of Dunkley, which I know the member for Dunkley is very pleased with and proud of.

The primary purpose of this program is to help Australian families reduce their energy bills and also reduce the use of gas, particularly in the energy system at night, which leads to cheaper bills. But it's also appropriate to note that this program has been very good at creating jobs. There has been a doubling of the number of battery installers in Australia since this program came in.

It's now 8,846. Many of those jobs have been created in our suburbs and in our regions. Take Western Sydney.

There have been 50 new jobs created at Penrith Solar Centre, which is in the electorate of Lindsay. PSC is a battery installer that many of us know very well. Those 50 new jobs include apprenticeships, installers and support works.

RKS in Mitchell, where the Prime Minister and I visited the other day, has gone from nine employees to 21 thanks to the cheaper home battery policy. This is very much a Western Sydney story. I told the House last week that the electorate of Mitchell now has one in eight houses with a cheaper home battery, which is a great result, but I've got more good news for the House.

I've got good news for the member for Hume, because the electorate of Hume is now the electorate with the third-highest take-up of cheaper home batteries in New South Wales. I know the member for Hume is a proud Western Sydney MP. In fact, of the seven electorates with more than 10 per cent of the households with cheaper home batteries, five of them are in Western Sydney.

We've got Hume. We've got Mitchell. We've got Greenway.

We've got Macquarie. We've got Chifley. This is a great result for those people in Western Sydney who are trying to reduce their bills with the support of the Albanese government and with no support from those opposite, who would abolish this program.

The member for Wannon has been very clear that this bill-busting program would go if the member for Hume was the Prime Minister of Australia. To those more than 10 per cent of his electorate who have taken up this policy and those who are planning to do it, he would say: 'No more. It all ends.' This program creates jobs for 137 installers in the electorate of Hume, and, for the more than 10 per cent of voters and households in his electorate who have chosen the cheaper home battery policy, they would end it all.

There is a clear choice: the Albanese government, which believes in helping Australian households, supporting Australian households in reducing their bills, or the Taylor opposition, which would stop it all because they don't like Australians reducing their bills through renewable energy. The SPEAKER: Prime Minister. Honourable members interjecting— The SPEAKER: No, the member for Riverina can take a seat.

Mr Albanese: I suggest he take it up with the Manager of Opposition Business. Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper. The SPEAKER: The Manager of Opposition Business, on a point of order?

Mr Tehan: The Prime Minister should finish with the gratuitous advice when he seeks leave to end question time. Can you just have a word to him for me, please? The SPEAKER: I think it takes two to tango.

I can appreciate we like a nice laugh at the end, but, if everyone does the right thing, we won't have any problems.