Former Liberal leader Sussan Ley is back in public life. Seven months after leaving federal politics, Ley was appointed by the Albanese Labor Government to the board of Snowy Hydro, alongside energy executive Merryn York.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen says Ley brings extensive experience in government and regional Australia. When asked how he squared the appointment with Ley's previous political positions, including a Coalition that had attacked Labor's renewable energy policies, Bowen was fairly blunt.
“I don't care how they vote. I don't really care what they've said about me in the past,” Bowen told the ABC. “I want to put them to work for the country.”
He pointed out that Ley is a former environment and water minister, that Snowy 2.0 was once within her electorate, and that she knows the project well.
The story isn't really that a former Liberal leader has suddenly crossed the floor to embrace a Labor project. Snowy 2.0 wasn't a Labor project in the first place.
It was theirs. Then it became Labor's and depending on which year you look at, both sides have supported Snowy Hydro, tried to sell Snowy Hydro, bought Snowy Hydro, expanded Snowy Hydro, funded Snowy Hydro, praised Snowy Hydro and blamed the other mob when Snowy Hydro became politically inconvenient.
Labor established the Snowy. Liberal tried to sell it. Labor supported the sale. Liberal abandoned the sale. Liberal later spent billions buying the whole thing. Labor didn't stand in the way. Liberal built Snowy 2.0. Ley welcomed it and approved it. Labor then inherited it, poured billions more into it and blamed Liberals for the mess, and now Labor has appointed Ley to help govern it.
If you're struggling to work out which side you're supposed to be angry at, don't worry. They've spent decades struggling with that themselves.
The original Snowy Mountains Scheme was established under Ben Chifley's Labor government in 1949. The incoming Menzies Coalition government then continued building it for the following decades.
Already, the great Australian political tradition was established: one side starts something, the other inherits it, and eventually everybody claims some ownership of the result. But things became considerably more interesting once governments started talking about selling it.
In 2006, John Howard's Coalition government moved to sell the Commonwealth's 13 per cent shareholding in Snowy Hydro alongside proposed sales by the NSW and Victorian governments.
Federal Labor supported the parliamentary resolution authorising the Commonwealth sale. Howard was happy to point that out.
Standing in Parliament in May 2006 defending the privatisation, Howard reminded MPs that Labor had supported the proposal and argued that selling the federal stake made sense because NSW had already decided to dispose of its majority holding.
Then the public revolted.
Within days, the Howard government reversed course and pulled the Commonwealth's shares from the sale.
In announcing the backflip on 2 June 2006, Howard said the government had listened to the “immense community reaction” and decided the sale would not deliver long-term benefits to the country.
Then came a sentence that has aged beautifully.
“The Australian Government has no intention of buying any additional shares in Snowy Hydro Limited.”
Fast-forward twelve years. A Liberal government bought the rest of Snowy Hydro.
FROM “WE'RE NOT BUYING IT” TO A $6 BILLION CHEQUE
In June 2018, Malcolm Turnbull's Coalition government purchased the NSW and Victorian governments' remaining Snowy Hydro shares, taking Commonwealth ownership from 13 per cent to 100 per cent. The Commonwealth paid approximately $6.1 billion.
NSW received more than $4 billion. Victoria received more than $2 billion. The Australian Government's own accounts valued its total Snowy Hydro investment at just over $7 billion once its existing stake was included.
So in the space of twelve years, Coalition policy had travelled from selling the Commonwealth's minority stake because buying the rest wouldn't make sense, to spending more than $6 billion buying everything it didn't already own.
Politics evolves, apparently.
The reason for bringing Snowy Hydro entirely under Commonwealth ownership was closely connected to the Coalition's next enormous idea.
Snowy 2.0.
The Turnbull government announced the expansion in 2017. The proposal involved connecting the Tantangara and Talbingo reservoirs through kilometres of underground tunnels and building a massive pumped-hydro energy storage system.
The Coalition sold it as nation-building infrastructure.
Reliable power.
Renewable power.
Cheaper power.
Energy security.
Jobs.
By February 2019, the Morrison government had formally given Snowy 2.0 shareholder approval and committed up to $1.38 billion in Commonwealth equity. The government's announcement said it had reviewed the business case and was satisfied that the project “stacks up”. It said Snowy 2.0 would help make renewables reliable, reduce volatility and “drive affordability” in electricity markets.
SUSSAN LEY WAS THERE
When Malcolm Turnbull announced Snowy 2.0 in 2017, Ley publicly welcomed it. Then, as Environment Minister in Scott Morrison's government, she played a direct role in allowing it to proceed.
On 30 June 2020, the Morrison government announced that Snowy 2.0 had received its final Commonwealth environmental approval. Ley was the Environment Minister who signed it off.
The government called Snowy 2.0 Australia's largest renewable energy project and said it would create thousands of jobs while putting downward pressure on electricity prices.
Ley said the approval had paved the way for critical infrastructure while imposing additional environmental protections relating to heritage, biodiversity and native fish species.
There is therefore nothing particularly inconsistent about Sussan Ley now joining the Snowy Hydro board. She supported the project when the Coalition was building it and approved it as Environment Minister. Ley represented a region with a major connection to the scheme.
THEN THE BILL ARRIVED
Snowy 2.0 didn't remain the shiny Coalition announcement forever. It became a construction project and construction projects have an irritating habit of eventually requiring somebody to explain the cost.
The project's 2018 final-investment-decision estimate was approximately $6.1 billion, including exploratory works.
By 2023, after Labor had returned to government, Snowy Hydro reset the project at $12 billion.
By 31 March 2026, the Australian National Audit Office says $11.1 billion had already been spent.
The Auditor-General also found that further cost increases were expected and that Snowy Hydro was likely to require additional government financial support.
Suddenly, Snowy 2.0 wasn't quite such a wonderful bipartisan nation-building story.
The Albanese government has repeatedly argued that it inherited serious problems with Snowy 2.0 from the Coalition. When the $12 billion reset was announced in 2023, Bowen and Finance Minister Katy Gallagher said the new government had discovered problems that had not been made public under its predecessor. They pointed to issues including design immaturity, geological conditions and escalating costs.
Bowen was still hammering the Coalition over it earlier this year. In Parliament in February, he attacked former Coalition energy minister Angus Taylor over delays to Snowy 2.0, accusing him of knowing the project was running two years late without telling the public. Bowen told Parliament the project was now 70 per cent complete and Labor was “repairing the work of the member for Hume”.
There it was. Their mess. Our repair job. Standard Canberra procedure.
Then seven months after hammering the Liberals, the same Chris Bowen appointed former Liberal Leader, Sussan Ley, to Snowy Hydro's board. Apparently some of the people responsible for the era Labor has spent criticising are also precisely the people qualified to help clean it up.
WHEN IT WORKS, EVERYBODY BUILT IT. WHEN IT FAILS, SOMEBODY ELSE DID.
Australians are constantly told that the difference between Labor and Liberal is existential. Every election is presented as a battle for the future of the country.
One side warns that the other will destroy the economy. The other warns that the first lot are hopelessly incompetent. Each blames the other for soaring bills, failed projects, cost blowouts, debt and poor decisions.
Then the election ends. The doors close and suddenly everybody seems capable of getting along.
The same projects continue.
The same money keeps flowing.
The same institutions remain.
The same people reappear.
Yesterday's incompetent political opponent becomes today's experienced board appointment.
Yesterday's government disaster becomes today's essential national infrastructure.
Snowy Hydro might be one of the clearest examples we've got.
Labor created it.
The Coalition continued it.
Governments corporatised it.
The Coalition tried to sell it.
Labor supported that sale.
The Coalition abandoned it.
The Coalition later bought the entire company. Labor didn't stop them.
The Coalition announced Snowy 2.0.
Labor broadly supported the concept.
The Coalition approved and funded it.
Sussan Ley signed off its environmental approval.
Labor inherited it.
Labor approved billions more in funding.
Labor blamed the Coalition for the blowouts, and now Labor has appointed Sussan Ley to the board.
It’s not left vs right politics, they’re cut from the same cloth. The division only becomes really important once something goes wrong and somebody needs to wear it.
