PRESENTER: Let's bring in today’s political panel now and I am joined in the studio by the by the Assistant Minister for Finance, Charities and Electrical Matters Zed Seselja, and making her debut appearance on Capitol Hill, Labor Member for Macquarie Susan Templeman.

We have been talking about the reshuffle today. This has been prompted by the National Party. Are you hoping that the Nationals clean up their act and stop becoming a liability for the government?

SESELJA: I don't accept that characterisation of our Nationals friends. Obviously they have been through some challenges in the last few days and they have made their decisions as a party room and that is what party rooms do from time to time. I am very pleased that we have got outstanding members of Parliament who can come into those senior roles. There is no shortage of talent either in the Nationals or the Liberal Party and when we see very good people moving out of the ministry, we see some outstanding people moving in to the ministry as well.

PRESENTER: Darren Chester earlier in the week apologised to Nationals voters for starting this parliamentary year with another leadership challenge. It seems to be the perennial issue in Australian politics. How frustrating was it standing from the Liberal side watching the Nationals possibly tear themselves apart?

SESELJA: I don’t accept the characterisation that you have made again. Obviously these things are always challenging. I have seen the inside of it and I am not going to sit there and lecture. There is no doubt that in terms of what we are getting on with, in terms of policy,  that is the most important thing. So these things do cause distractions, but the Nationals have made their decision and are getting on with it as is the government.

PRESENTER: Susan Templeman, I am loathe to give either party free kicks when it comes to internal divisions on either side. As to the reshuffle as we were discussing earlier, Keith Pitt now has both Resources and Water. Does Labor have any concerns about those two portfolios being under the same minister?

TEMPLEMAN: It is obviously early days in terms of how the new minister will handle it. You are spot-on, they have been in a mess. We need to see them get their act together because Water is an absolutely crucial portfolio and the sustainability of our whole economy, our communities, our agriculture depends on them getting it right. So I think it does raise questions about how that is going to be managed. I think we also have to look at his absolute love of nuclear energy and the Prime Minister needs to come clean, having put him in this position, as to what the plan is for nuclear energy. So there are - this will raise a lot of issues and it is clearly something that the Prime Minister has to manage because the Nationals are a key part of that coalition, but, yes, they cause some trouble.

PRESENTER: He has been certainly advocating nuclear power from the book bench. Now he is within the tent in Cabinet, you would imagine that his views will be more in line with government policy. There is of course an inquiry under way into nuclear power at the moment. Labor, as the part policy remains, firmly opposed. Can you ever see that changing?

TEMPLEMAN: I can’t see it changing. I guess we will see what inquiry position it takes. The other really disappointing thing about the start of this Parliament was that the national leadership took away from our first day focus on the bushfires. Now, that was on mourning people who had died in those fires and mourning the losses that people had experienced and I think this Parliament would be great to see some discipline so that the really big issues that affect people, not hear in Canberra, but in their own homes, are given the priority.

PRESENTER: Your electorate was devastated in parts from the bushfire crisis, sticking with that theme - the Blue Mountains were ablaze over summer. We know the there is a Royal Commission that will be coming out this whole crisis. What are the issues that you and your constituents identified on the ground that should be looked at as part of this commission?

TEMPLEMAN: I would like to see it incredibly wide-ranging inquiry. I think it is disappointing that people whose areas have been very directly affected, like mine, like the South Coast, haven't been consulted at all about the terms of reference for the inquiry. We do want to see everything from the impact of climate change looked at. How did that play out in this particular circumstance, through to the need for policies that people think will achieve our outcome on traditional burning and hazard reductions. I think we need to see the whole spectrum of things. I hope we will have a good look at how we resource our emergency services appropriately to be able to respond to these. The fire in my region that hit the Blue Mountains the Hawkesbury was the largest-ever recorded fire in the world from a single ignition point. That is huge. This is an unprecedented thing and the inquiry, what worries me is it sounds like it might be a quick-and-dirty inquiry. It needs to be thorough and it needs to give people the chance on the ground to tell their stories of what they experienced. They have been through a trauma. They need to be able to share that and the lessons learned from it.

PRESENTER: The Prime Minister has said that he wants to see the inquiry wrapped up so that the recommendations can be put in place for the next fire season coming. We have soon some of the terms of reference, so it will include hazard reduction and include the phrase "climate change is affecting Australia's ability to prevent, mitigate and respond to natural disasters". That is in the terms of reference. So climate change will be a part of that. Do you agree with that statement, that climate change is affecting Australia's ability to prevent and mitigate these disasters?

SESELJA: Clearly, as the we temperature warms - and that is what we have seen over the last couple of decades in particular - you are geeing to face greater challenges when it comes to things like fire. All things being equal, if you have warmer weather, if you have the same amount of fuel you are going to have problems. You have got to look at it from the perspective, you do your bit with the global community on emissions reduction but at a local level in addition for this, you have to plan for the fact it will be warmer and in which case you need less fuel. You need to have better fuel management than we have had in the past. We always have had bushfires, but it will just be a question of, if you get more warm days, you have more risk on some of those summers. Not every summer will be like that. Summers go up and down like we have seen in recent years but here in Canberra in 2003 we experienced some of the severest bushfires this country’s ever seen. Almost 500 homes lost. They are still burning in parts of the ACT at the moment. Fuel reduction - how we manage that. I don’t think that’s been done very well in this country in recent years. I remember after the 2003 bushfires here there was a lot of soul searching here. Yet the targets don't get met. We saw it after Black Saturday in 2009. It has to be front and centre. One of the reasons that the PM has said, we are going to look at what has been done because there have been many, many inquiries in bushfires in this country. We are not going to reinvent the wheel. We will learn from those and how in a new environment we continue to respond.

PRESENTER:  Should states and territories be penalised if they don't meet targets for hazard reduction and on that topic, was it a big problem last year because it was so dry? A lot of hazard reductions couldn't go ahead because the weather was setting in?

SESELJA: You have to look at that. We have to look at what are the land clearing laws. It is not just what government does but in parts of Queensland and other places land holders are frustrated they can protect their land. We have heard many stories across the country of that happening. Yes, when it is dry, it is hard, but you will have periods where you can and certainly we believe some form of national standards for hazard reduction is absolutely critical as with respond to that. It is always interesting to me that when we hear from the Greens in particular who talk about things like a climate emergency and the like, but they are the first to reject measures who would protect if you are going to have warmer weather.

PRESENTER: This whole bushfire season has shifted the debate of energy and climate change or put the spotlight on that. Matt Canavan this week said that he wants to see coal-fired power stations built across the country. The Prime Minister Scott Morrison addressed this just a moment ago in a press conference. We will bring you that grab now.

MORRISON: It is a common-sense position that recognises that the reliability of our energy system, our electricity system, depends on those stations and that is why those assets will be swept for as long as possible and you will know in to arrangement that we came to with the New South Wales government just the other week, it just didn't deliver another 70 pedajoules a year of gas. It also required the removal of obstacles that would see the resource get to the Mount Piper coal-fired power plant as well. Why? Because that is necessary to meet the duel objectives of reliability in the system which keeps power prices down, but also enables you to move over time to what the market is clearly already recognising and acting upon.

PRESENTER: So that was Scott Morrison there talking about the government's emissions - sorry, the government's energy policy particularly in light of that suggestion from Matt Canavan. Just staying with you for a moment, Zed. Is Matt Canavan throwing a bone to his voters in Queensland on this issue of coal which we know is a really big topic up there or is this something that the government should be considering?

SESELJA: Well, we consider all reasonable measures to make sure we achieve our ends and our ends are, we want to meet our reduction targets and keep the lights on and we want to have reliable, affordable electricity for our economy and we want to continue to support jobs. So all of those things coming together mean we have investments in renewable energy. That is good. We continue to see either the extension of the life of coal-fired power in some circumstances and we certainly still see a coal industry in this country, but also we see a transition with things like gas and that is some of the announcements that we’ve seen. We don’t throw all of our eggs into one part of the energy mix. I think Anthony Albanese recognised recently that even with some of their I think irresponsible targets, that even with a 50% renewable target, that 50% clearly would still come from fossil fuels.

PRESENTER: Susan Templeman just to finish on this. Labor is still deciding what sort of emissions reduction target it will take to the next election. I understand it is a long way away. It looks like the 45% by 2030 has been dumped. Do you think between the last election and now the debate has changed? Should Labor be more ambitious or even more ambitious than it has been?

TEMPLEMAN: I think a lot of things have changed since then, but they will change going forward. This summer and spring of bushfires has changed things and the most interesting thing that the Prime Minister said then was that the technology