Leading up to the Federal Election, expected in May, the South Australian Business Chamber is bringing you short profiles on key South Australian politicians, sharing their business priorities and interests. This week’s profile, the fourth in our series so far, is on Labor Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy, Mark Butler.
Mr Butler was born on the Labor side of politics, and after completing a law degree in the early 1990s he became secretary of the South Australian branch of the Liquour, Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union (which later became United Voice). In 1997 he became the youngest ever president of the South Australian Labor Party.
He was elected to the federal seat of Port Adelaide in 2007 and appointed Minister for Mental Health and Ageing in the Gillard Government in 2010. He has since served in several roles under different leaders, in government and opposition.
Throughout his career Mr Butler has had close dealings with the business community through wage cases as a union representative to speaking to thousands of owners, operators and often disadvantaged workers in various industry sectors.
He has spent a great deal of time working with the aged care sector, understanding its challenges and opportunities, including the ageing population, workforce shortages and future demands for services.
Mr Butler has had a focus on climate and energy over the past six years, as the nation has tackled issues including droughts, energy market changes, and the transition from coal to renewables.
“My portfolio over the past several years has been very deeply engaged with the business community, and in energy South Australia has been very much a focal point of the transition that’s underway at different levels and different states in the energy and electricity industry in particular, but also in other parts of the sector as well,” Mr Butler said.
As part of his role, he has been involved with stakeholders from different sectors of the economy including agriculture, transport, mining about how to manage the challenges and the opportunities of a changing climate.
Mr Butler is aware of the ever-increasing price of energy and knows that costs are unlikely to come down in the near future.
“Nailing that is perhaps I think the most significant economic challenge that we have now… most of the country is in the throes of a very deep energy crisis and unlike previous experiences like this, this is largely of our own making. This is not the result of an external shock like the oil crisis of 74,” he said.
“This is really reflective of a profound public policy failure in managing the deep transition that’s happening in our energy sector. Partly it’s because of technological change that’s sweeping the globe, partly it’s because of the imperative to deal with high levels of carbon pollution in our electricity sector, partly it’s just a timing section that the vast bulk of our energy infrastructure was built in the early 1960s, 70s and 80s…. we’ve now been thinking of what we do to invest in a new generation of infrastructure that will last for the next 40 to 50 years.”
He is confident the South Australian economy will continue to grow, despite the national economy struggling under the weight of falling house prices, banking industry woes and international political tensions from Brexit to US-China tensions. Mr Butler would like to see population and jobs growth, helped by emerging industries such as defence and ship building.
