MATTERS OF URGENCY

Senator BLEYER (Tasmania) (16:45): Fossil fuel companies should pay their fair share of tax to transition away from fossil fuels. This is so important when it comes to decommissioning offshore oil and gas rigs. What is going on is that onshore mining companies are required to pay a bond to ensure that they clean up after themselves once they've finished extracting on land.

Renters have to pay the landlord a bond to ensure they can clean up after themselves when they move out of their home. But, with offshore oil and gas, the companies are not required to pay a bond to clean up after themselves. There is currently 600 kilotons of offshore oil and gas infrastructure in our oceans.

That will cost $60 billion to clean up. Who's going to foot the bill? Let me give you an example.

In July this year, a company decided that it didn't have the money to clean up after itself after it had finished extracting from our oceans. So it decided to go insolvent. And then this Labor government just moved a legislative instrument requiring money that originates from taxpayers to clean up this abandoned offshore rig.

These offshore rigs, which sit there doing nothing, are polluting our oceans. They are emitting poisons into our oceans which are impacting our marine wildlife. This is an urgent matter.

The taxpayers in this country should not be here paying for the clean-up for mega-rich fossil fuel companies of the mess that they are leaving in our oceans. I support this urgency motion. This parliament should make sure that the mega-rich fossil fuel corporations are paying their way to transition away from fossil fuels and cleaning up after themselves.