{"id":15582,"date":"2026-05-21T04:51:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T04:51:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/15582\/"},"modified":"2026-05-21T04:51:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T04:51:13","slug":"liberal-leader-angus-taylor-spruiks-gas-extraction-in-adelaide-as-sa-party-opposes-fracking-proposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/15582\/","title":{"rendered":"Liberal leader Angus Taylor spruiks gas extraction in Adelaide as SA party opposes fracking proposal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Federal Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has brushed off questions about whether his enthusiasm for gas extraction is at odds with that of the South Australian Liberals, who oppose a proposal to end a ban on fracking in the state’s South East.<\/p>\n

Mr Taylor, who told an oil and gas conference in Adelaide on Thursday that the Coalition would ensure approvals for oil and gas projects were fast-tracked, said there was room for “localised debates” about individual gas projects, and that he supported state governments making decisions on approvals.<\/p>\n

The South Australian Labor government has spent the past week<\/a> trying to wedge the Liberal Party and One Nation<\/a> for opposing gas fracking on the Limestone Coast, accusing the two parties of being at odds with their federal counterparts and their own pro-gas policies<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The extraction method, involving the injection of water, sand and chemicals deep underground to allow gas to flow to the surface, is subject to a 10-year ban in the region.<\/p>\n

\"Three<\/p>\n

Anti-fracking protesters at the country cabinet meeting in Mount Gambier last week. (ABC South East SA: Samuel O’Brien)<\/p>\n

The moratorium was legislated by the former Marshall Liberal government<\/a> in response to community concerns it would damage the local aquifer.<\/p>\n

With many farmers and producers still opposed to fracking, the Greens, One Nation and the Liberal Party have flagged that they will block a government attempt to end the moratorium<\/a> before it expires in 2028.<\/p>\n

Risk of spoiling aquifer ‘too great’<\/p>\n

SA Shadow Treasurer Ben Hood, from SA’s South East, said the Liberal Party believed the risk fracking posed to the local economy was “too great”.<\/p>\n

“The risk in a single failure means that aquifer is gone,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Even the thought of a risk could actually undermine the ‘clean, green, pristine’ marketing that Coonawarra uses.”<\/p>\n

\"Ripe<\/p>\n

The Coonawarra region is known for its cabernet sauvignon wine. (ABC South East SA: Elsie Adamo)<\/p>\n

Mr Taylor told the Australian Energy Producers conference on Thursday that “we need to get busy digging and drilling”.<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters afterwards, he would not be drawn on whether his policy was at odds with the South Australian party.<\/p>\n

“Our policy is to get more oil and gas out from under the ground and leave it to the state governments to make decisions and get approvals in a timely way,” he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Taylor said he supported getting more oil and gas out of the ground, “but I also support \u2026 letting state government make the decisions on local projects”.<\/p>\n

“There’s localised debates that have got to go on about individual gas projects and renewable projects, and all sorts of other projects \u2014 that’s the purview of state governments,” he said.<\/p>\n

“What I would say to state governments is: make decisions, make them fast, give clarity and let investment happen wherever it can possibly happen.”<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

Fracking is allowed in other parts of South Australia, as well as some other states. (ABC News: Hamish Harty)<\/p>\n

‘NIMBYism’ from local Liberals<\/p>\n

SA Energy and Mining Minister Tom Koutsantonis accused Mr Taylor of hypocrisy.<\/p>\n

“Today you saw Angus Taylor basically say he doesn’t like moratoriums and walking away from the state Liberal Party and leaving them, quite frankly, out there on their own,” Mr Koutsantonis said.<\/p>\n

He accused the SA Liberal Party of “attempting to outbid One Nation in NIMBYism”.<\/p>\n

“My point is, it’s not up to politicians, it’s up to the scientists,” Mr Koutsantonis said on fracking in the South East.<\/p>\n

“Let the scientists decide whether it’s safe, not [One Nation federal leader] Pauline Hanson, not Angus Taylor and certainly not [SA Liberal Leader] Ashton Hurn.”<\/p>\n

Ms Hanson is scheduled to address the energy producers conference later on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Her party won three upper house seats at the March state election, meaning the moratorium could be scrapped if it backed Labor’s legislation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has brushed off questions about whether his enthusiasm for gas extraction is at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15583,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[395,468,15560,15562,13466,15564,13136,1926,318,15563,15561],"class_list":["post-15582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-adelaide","tag-adelaide","tag-angus-taylor","tag-australian-energy-producers-conference-exhibition","tag-beach-energy","tag-convention-centre","tag-extinction-rebellion","tag-fracking","tag-pauline-hanson","tag-peter-malinauskas","tag-santos","tag-south-east"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15582\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}