Barnaby Joyce Just Lost It on Live TV Over $150 Power Rebates — And It Got Really Weird

"It's a Band-Aid on an Amputated Leg"

Barnaby Joyce doesn't do subtle.

Appearing on Seven's Sunrise Monday morning, the New England MP was asked about reports that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese might extend the $150 power bill subsidy if electricity prices continue rising.

His response was immediate and theatrical.

"It's a Band-Aid on an amputated leg that's happened out in the paddock," Joyce declared.

For those not fluent in Barnaby-speak, translation: The energy rebate is a completely inadequate response to a catastrophic problem.

"What we see is all the things that 10 years has brought up, where the taxpayers' money is given back to the taxpayers or to non-taxpayers. It's not about fundamental change, and the intermediate power swindle has brought a structural decline, a structural basically destruction, of our power grid."

Host Nat Barr tried to get a straight answer: Did he support the rebates or not?

Joyce's response was classic Joyce—avoiding the yes-or-no question while launching into another attack.

The Tense Exchange with Tanya Plibersek

The segment got uncomfortable when Social Services Minister Tanya Plibersek, appearing on the same panel, challenged Joyce's position.

Joyce had been speaking at length—criticizing the government's new Solar Saver scheme and broader energy policy—when Plibersek tried to interject.

That's when Joyce lost it.

"You just spoke for about five minutes before," Joyce told Plibersek. "So if you don't like me interrupting, you don't interrupt me. How's that for a deal?"

The exchange highlighted the hostile relationship between Joyce and the Labor government—and Joyce's increasingly combative style even in relatively tame morning TV settings.

Plibersek had simply asked whether Joyce voted for or against the affordability measure. A reasonable question, given he was simultaneously criticizing it while refusing to say if he'd vote against it.

Joyce treated it as an outrage that anyone would interrupt his monologue.

The Biblical Dog-Vomit Comparison

Just when you thought the segment couldn't get weirder, Joyce reached for Scripture.

Asked again whether he supported the rebates, Joyce responded: "I think that you'll get to a position where you'll be politically jammed into supporting them, but I don't support intermittent power... while solar panels and wind towers (are) in every corner of the nation, and whilst we keep on making this massive mistake, just doubling up and doing it again."

Then came the Biblical flourish:

"It's like a dog returning to his vomit, as the Bible tells you. If you're making a stuff-up, you stop it. You don't continue on."

For those wondering, Joyce is referencing Proverbs 26:11: "As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly."

Barnaby Joyce just compared Australia's renewable energy policy to a dog eating its own vomit on breakfast television.

It's unclear whether comparing your political opponents to vomit-eating dogs is an effective rhetorical strategy, but Joyce is apparently willing to find out.

What the Rebates Actually Are

Lost in Joyce's theatrical denunciations is what the energy rebates actually do:

2024-25 Financial Year:

• Households: $300 total (four quarterly instalments of $75)
• Small businesses: $325 total (four quarterly instalments of $81.25)
• Applied automatically to electricity bills
• No application needed for most customers

2025-26 Extension (July-December 2025):

• Households: Additional $150 (two quarterly instalments of $75)
• Small businesses: Additional $150 (two instalments of $75)
• Also applied automatically

Total rebate over 18 months:$450 per household

Cost to government: $1.8 billion for the six-month extension

Estimated impact:

• Reduces household bills by 7.5% on average
• Reduces headline inflation by around 0.5 percentage point

The rebates are designed to offset rising electricity prices while Labor implements broader energy market reforms.

Albanese Won't Commit to Further Extension

At a Canberra press conference Monday, Anthony Albanese played coy about extending rebates beyond December 2025.

"The rebates that are in place are the ones that are in place," the PM said. "We'll continue to focus, though — each and every day — on things that Australians are concerned about."

When reporters pressed, Albanese added: "I've said the rebates won't be a permanent feature. We will always look, though, at cost of living as our number one priority."

Translation: Maybe, maybe not, depending on what electricity prices do and what political pressure looks like heading into the next election.

The Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook (MYEFO), expected soon, could be the vehicle for announcing any extension.

Joyce's Claims About "De-Industrialisation"

Central to Joyce's argument is that renewable energy is destroying Australian manufacturing.

"Quite self-evidently, at the end of the day, you're going to have, just like you've de-industrialised our nation, just like all the major heavy industries are leaving, just like people can't afford their power bill, you're going to be stuck with the Labor Party intermittent fiasco," Joyce said.

He's not entirely wrong that some energy-intensive industries struggle with Australian electricity costs. Aluminum smelters, for example, have faced pressure.

But attributing this entirely to renewable energy is simplistic. Factors include:

• Global competition from countries with cheaper labor
• Australia's geographic isolation
• Legacy coal plant closures (many privately owned and closed for commercial reasons)
• Transition period challenges as renewable capacity ramps up
• Lack of sufficient storage/battery capacity to smooth intermittent supply

Joyce frames renewables as the sole cause of every energy problem—ignoring that aging coal plants were closing regardless, that gas prices spiked due to global markets, and that renewable energy is now the cheapest form of new electricity generation.

The "Intermittent Power" Attack

Joyce repeatedly refers to "intermittent power"—his shorthand for solar and wind energy that only generates when the sun shines or wind blows.

This is a real technical challenge. Renewable energy generation varies, requiring either:

• Battery storage to smooth supply
• Gas backup for when renewables aren't generating
• Interconnectors to move power from areas with generation to areas with demand
• Demand management to reduce consumption during peak times

But Joyce presents intermittency as an unsolvable fatal flaw that makes renewables worthless, rather than a manageable engineering challenge that requires appropriate investment in storage and grid infrastructure.

The Recent Split from Nationals

Joyce's increasingly extreme rhetoric on energy has reportedly created tensions within the National Party.

The article notes Joyce "recently distanced himself from the Nationals over energy policy"—suggesting his views are too hardline even for his own party.

National Party leadership has tried to moderate its energy messaging, recognizing that blanket opposition to renewables is politically untenable in many electorates where solar and wind projects provide jobs and revenue.

Joyce, representing the rural New England electorate, faces less political pressure to moderate. His constituency includes more climate skeptics and people concerned about visual impact of wind turbines on rural landscapes.

But his vomit-dog rhetoric may be too much even for allies.

What Joyce Wants Instead

Joyce's preferred alternative is never entirely clear from his rants, but context from his other statements suggests:

Nuclear power: Joyce has supported nuclear energy as baseload power Coal: Keep existing coal plants running longer Gas: Expand gas generation capacity Opposition to: Large-scale solar and wind farms

The problem: Nuclear would take 15-20 years and tens of billions of dollars to build in Australia. Coal plants are closing because they're economically unviable and literally falling apart. Gas is expensive and contributes to emissions.

Joyce's vision for energy policy is essentially "keep doing what worked 30 years ago" without acknowledging the economics and technology have fundamentally changed.

The Cost-of-Living Cover-Up Claim

Joyce accused the government of "recklessly spending resources to 'cover up a cost-of-living crisis.'"

This is an interesting argument: The government is trying to help people with cost of living, and Joyce's critique is... that they're trying to help people with cost of living?

His point seems to be that rebates are temporary Band-Aids rather than structural solutions. He's not entirely wrong—rebates don't fix underlying energy market problems.

But his alternative isn't "here's a better structural solution." His alternative is "stop building renewables and somehow that will make electricity cheaper," which doesn't actually address the immediate cost-of-living pressures families face.

The Reality Check on Power Prices

Joyce claims power prices went "higher than $17,000 for a unit of electricity that once cost us $50."

He's referring to wholesale market prices during extreme demand events—not what households actually pay.

Retail electricity prices (what you pay on your bill) are regulated and include:

• Wholesale electricity costs (about 30-40% of your bill)
• Network costs (poles and wires, about 40-50%)
• Retail margin and other costs (about 10-20%)

Yes, wholesale prices spike during extreme events. But your retail rate doesn't suddenly become $17,000/MWh because the spot market spikes for a few hours.

Joyce's $17,000 figure is technically accurate for wholesale prices during extreme events but deliberately misleading about what consumers actually pay.

The Solar Saver Scheme Joyce Hates

Joyce also criticized Labor's new Solar Saver scheme, though the article doesn't detail his specific objections.

The Solar Saver program helps households install solar panels and batteries through subsidized loans, aiming to reduce electricity bills and grid demand.

Joyce presumably opposes it as another "intermittent power" initiative—despite rooftop solar being one of the most popular and effective cost-saving measures for Australian households.

His opposition to helping people save money on power bills through solar seems... inconsistent with complaining about power bills being too high.

The Bottom Line

Barnaby Joyce gave a masterclass in theatrical political outrage Monday morning—comparing energy policy to dogs eating vomit, snapping at a Cabinet Minister, and declaring the power grid has "gone off a cliff."

His core message: $150 rebates are inadequate Band-Aids that don't address structural problems caused by renewable energy "de-industrializing" Australia.

He's partially right that rebates don't fix underlying issues. But his solution—apparently to stop renewable energy development and return to fossil fuels—doesn't address the reality that coal plants are closing, renewable energy is now cheapest, and climate change is accelerating.

Meanwhile, Albanese won't commit to extending rebates beyond December, suggesting the government sees them as temporary measures while broader energy market reforms take effect.

And somewhere, a Biblical dog is probably very confused about why Barnaby Joyce is talking about it on breakfast television.