Anthony Albanese goes on the nuclear attack as Peter Dutton says details will be drip-fed

Peter Dutton and his frontbench have remained defiant in the face of questioning and criticism over the Coalition’s nuclear power policy, vowing to release the full details to Australians in “bite-sized pieces”.

The Prime Minister has led the attack, questioning how a Coalition “who’d struggle to assemble an IKEA flat pack” would be able to build a nuclear energy industry in Australia from scratch, equating the plan to a fairytale that he claimed risked ruining the economy.

Under the Coalition’s plan announced on Wednesday, seven ageing coal-fired power stations across Australia would become Commonwealth-owned nuclear reactors — Liddell and Mt Piper in NSW, Tarong and Callide in Queensland, Loy Yang in Victoria, Port Augusta in South Australia and Muja in Western Australia.

Mr Dutton vowed the first of them would be up and running by 2035 to 2037, with all in the system by 2050 using existing transmission lines.

But questions about how much the project would cost, when Australians could see a return on investment, the types of reactors that would be used, and whether that timeline was viable remain, and dominated the political news cycle on Thursday.

Facing questions about the finer details, Mr Dutton said the Coalition had been “deliberate” in not offering up all the information upfront.

“We want the information out there in bite-sized bits so that people can consume exactly what it is that we’re proposing and understand what it’s not proposing,” Mr Dutton told ABC News.

“We’ll release the next stage in due course. There’s been months and months and months of work put into this policy, I believe it’s in our country’s best interests.”

Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor, meanwhile, assured Australians they would have all the details before the next election.

“We will announce all of our costings before the election at an appropriate time-frame. And we will announce our policies before the election,” he said.

But Anthony Albanese predicted the details “won’t be out there” before Australians head to the polls as he warned voters not to fall for the Coalition’s “trust me” attitude.

“This is a mob that when they’re in government, couldn’t build a commuter car park, but say the federal government — who has no experience whatsoever in building (federal) government-owned energy assets — (would build them),” Mr Albanese told Sky News.

“Now you would have us believe that a mob who struggle to assemble an IKEA flat-pack are going to start from scratch and be able to develop a nuclear energy industry in Australia, even though they can’t say what form the nuclear reactors will take?”

He branded the plan as a “fantasy”, and accused the Coalition of taking a “radioactive sledgehammer” to the Australian economy.

“Instead of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, this is Peter Dutton and the seven nuclear reactors. This is just absurd, to have a big build-up for an announcement and then say we won’t give you the details,” he told ABC Radio.

“There’s no costings. There’s no serious timeframe. There’s no proportion of how much nuclear will be a part of the energy system. There’s no details of what type of reactor they will build. The policy has fallen apart within 24 hours.”

Mr Albanese said his biggest concern was that the policy was a recipe for “higher costs”, despite the Coalition on Wednesday saying nuclear would cost “a fraction” of Labor’s renewable spend and lead to cheaper power bills.

When pressed on the Coalition’s claim that nuclear would make Australians’ energy bills cheaper over time, Mr Taylor danced around the question.

“Our energy policy will and is absolutely focused on driving down prices ... this is the important point. That is because of a range of technologies, not one, and nuclear needs to be part of that mix,” he told ABC Radio.

“You need to have every horse in this race. This is a hard race to win.”

Among the biggest challenges the Coalition will face in bringing the policy to fruition should they win the next election is convincing not only the communities -- but the state governments.

The Coalition appeared divided on what would happen if one of the communities at the seven proposed sites overwhelmingly opposed a nuclear reactor.

Nationals leader David Littleproud was forced to pull his deputy, Perin Davey, into line after she said the Coalition “will not proceed” if a community was adamantly opposed.

Mr Littleproud said that was “not correct”.

“Peter Dutton and David Littleproud, as part of a Coalition government, are prepared to make the tough decisions in the national interest,” he said.

Mr Dutton said there would be at least a two-year consultation period with communities, and the policy includes a suite of packages to benefit them.

Convincing the Mt Piper community, in Nationals-turned-independent MP Andrew Gee’s electorate of Callare, could be especially difficult.

“The overwhelming emotion yesterday was one of shock, because this was basically dropped on the community, and one of the themes that really came through yesterday ... is where has the consultation been?” Mr Gee told ABC News.

“I think there are people who support nuclear power, but they’re cranky about it, and (want to know) why this announcement was made in a city skyscraper.

“Even supporters of nuclear power are raising the issue of where are the details on this proposal? So many questions need to be answered.”

A Coalition government will also need to overhaul a federal moratorium on nuclear power, and overcome nuclear bans in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria.

All three premiers have ruled out repealing the ban.

The South Australian and Western Australian leaders have also expressed opposition to Mr Dutton’s plan.

Mr Dutton on Wednesday said the Coalition would be able to “negotiate” with the state premiers.

But Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan, who wrote to Mr Dutton saying her government “won’t be negotiating”, doubled down on Thursday.

“What the Liberal National Party is saying to Victoria and the nation, they want to reject that evidence, they want to reject that future for our state and our country. They want to bring toxic, risky and expensive nuclear energy to our country and we just will not stand for that,” she said.

Queensland premier Steven Miles said his government will do “everything we can to block (Mr Dutton’s) plan to build expensive nuclear reactors in Queensland”.

“We know this will cost hundreds of billions of dollars and that will mean people’s electricity bills will be higher, and I’m concerned about the future generations of Queenslanders who will need to manage this dangerous radioactive waste forever,” he told ABC News.

“We just don’t need it.”

South Australian premier Peter Malinauskas, who has previously been open to nuclear energy, said his primary concern with Mr Dutton’s proposal was cost, and the lack of detail around that was “scary”.

“There’s only one or two things that have happened. Either Peter Dutton knows how much the cost is and he’s refusing to tell us – or, even more scary, he’s announced a policy without even knowing how much it’s possible,” he said.