Dutton has set a nuclear trap to stoke another Climate War. If Labor takes the bait, then it’s curtains at the next election

Peter Dutton is not serious about nuclear energy but thinks it might just win him the next election. Labor has only one card up its sleeve to keep him out of the lodge.

There’s something perversely beautiful about Peter Dutton’s nuclear play. It’s a breathtaking fallacy but politically clever on so many levels.

Designed to tap into voter fears about the economy and livelihoods, Dutton’s nuclear vision is already making inroads with nervous regional voters because it means we keep the same poles and wires and the same power generation sites across our regions. By extension, nuclear means that the communities around our coal-fired power stations will continue to exist, especially as each nuclear site will need a skilled workforce to operate them.

Nuclear also means we keep the spatial footprint of our net-zero energy transition smaller, helping us avoid some of the hot-button issues confronting the renewables transition, such as its impact on biodiversity, cultural heritage, and public amenities.

Dutton’s nuclear vision is also a wink to conservative voters across Australia. Although nuclear is low carbon, it’s certainly not the “woke energy” that the left is peddling to corrupt our children and emasculate our men (or whatever they say about renewables on the MAGA feeds).

Nuclear keeps the fossil fuel donors on board, too, because (again, wink wink) the 2035 implementation timeframe is impossibly tight, meaning we can milk from the black teats for a bit longer. And because all the talk of nuclear being incompatible with renewable energy will bring on an investment malaise, renewables penetration will slow even if the Coalition shirks outright war on them.

Simply put, for as long as the nuclear beast is alive, it will have a toxic influence over the Australian renewables sector.

It’s a brilliant political play. 

Is this really high risk for Dutton?

There’s plenty of commentary suggesting that this is a high risk play by Dutton. Sure, it’s bold, but where exactly is all the risk?

Those “in the know” certainly know that Dutton’s nuclear vision isn’t a serious proposition on basic economic grounds. Counterintuitively, this will keep his party room united because there’s an understanding that it’s simply a re-election tactic, not a serious policy. The fact is that Dutton needed to come out with something bold so that people would start paying attention to him.

Dutton’s nuclear vision is already resonating with voters for reasons discussed and for the simple fact that it’s easier to grasp than Labor’s more complicated vision. But perhaps more importantly, voters know deep down that in a cost-of-living crisis, the Coalition will ultimately pull the plug on nuclear if it’s proven unviable.

Crucially, the Coalition knows that it can play with voter trust like this and get away with it. That’s because, despite a recent track record of Soviet-style interventions that have drained the public purse (think the “direct action” climate policy and the haemorrhaging Snowy Hydro 2.0) and a string of recent budget deficits, the electorate is still conditioned to believe that the Coalition is the free markets party that champions fiscal conservatism. So, voter intuition is that the Coalition won’t go ahead with nuclear if it’s proven fiscally reckless. The foundation of Dutton’s nuclear strategy is this unspoken deal, and it makes voting nuclear much less scary to the average punter than Labor suggests.

Labor will lose the election unless they drop the ‘C’ word

Peter Dutton is deliberately trying to frame this fight as the next instalment of the climate wars, knowing that he’ll be undefeatable on this turf. That’s because framing this as a climate debate will condition voters to view Labor’s Future Made in Australia plan as motivated by climate objectives and, therefore, economically burdensome.

For Labor to have any chance of slaying the nuclear beast, it will have to come out swinging on economic grounds with no more than a footnote referencing climate. That wouldn’t be disingenuous either because affordable, abundant, and reliable energy is at the heart of any successful economy. So, by Dutton picking a fight over Australia’s energy sector transition, he’s picking a fight over nothing less than Australia’s economic future.

Fighting Dutton on economic grounds would necessitate a step up from Jim Chalmers to champion the vision. A tactical retreat from Chris Bowen might also be wise for no reason other than that his ministerial portfolio undermines him by linking energy to climate. It might sound pedantic, but details matter.  

Labor also has its back against the wall to simplify its tangled vision of poles and wires that is scaring off voters. If regional communities and the mortgage belt are truly better off under Labor’s policy, then it will need to take next-level details to key communities and demographics before the next election. AEMO’s just released 25 year transition roadmap for the NEM provides critical support in the task of explaining the renewables vision to voters.

Deep down, we all know that this net-zero energy transition will be difficult, but renewables, on the back of spectacular advancements in cost and performance, have morphed into the foundations of a stronger and more diversified future Australian economy. Framing renewables as solutions to the climate crisis might be truthful, but in an acrimonious economics debate against a unified front of climate denialists, it would also be tactically dumb.

Labor has just one card to play if it wants to keep power at the next election. Vulnerable voters will want to know that the government’s renewable energy vision is all about the economy, and Labor will need to scream this from the (solar-powered) rooftops.