From the office of ROLAND ROCCHICCIOLI

THERE are those fleeting moments when one wonders — figuratively — “if the lunatics are in charge of the asylum!” What exactly, one ponders, is happening in the minds of those making decisions — both big and small — which drastically affect our lives.

Not a day passes when I do not audibly curse a decision taken by the Minister for Energy, the Hon. Liliana D’Ambrosio. She is the genesis of a profound and abiding fury in my daily life — and we have never met!

Having been touched by the cosmos with infallible judgement — and by osmosis imbued with the wisdom of the Seven Sages of Greece — Ms. D’Ambrosio spearheaded the decision to remove gas cookers from Victorian homes.

In 2024, the state government banned gas connections in all new homes. The decision meant no gas for heating, hot water, or cooking facilities for new, and some old, homes. At the same time it became mandatory to replace faulty gas cookers with an electric appliance in existing homes.

Given the magnitude of world climate change it is — theoretically — a sound initiative — and to be applauded for its far-sightedness. The gas ban is part of Victoria’s move to clean energy and a determination to reach net zero emissions by 2045; however, the radical application was ill-conceived — even stupid!

During the limited period of forced electrification I was — against my will and as consequence of government hide — compulsorily required to replace a gas cooker with an electric appliance.

Power failures are not an uncommon occurrence and they render an all-electric household impotent — eliminating even the capacity to heat water to make a cup of tea. For households with babies, or children under twelve, it creates an intolerable predicament. On those occasions when power companies are rostered to perform regular maintenance work — and often for some hours in the day — households are becalmed. I recall one Sunday being without electricity from 8am until 2pm. Despite preparation it was an intolerable bother.

To my profound chagrin, the minister abandoned the mandatory electrification edict. Homeowners in Victoria — Ms. D’Ambrosio breezily announced — are no longer forced to replace broken gas heating systems or cooktops with electric devices.

The original ruling is unfortunate and one which transforms drastically a significant part of our lives. It diminishes culinary pleasure. Food is foremost and the difference between cooking with gas and electricity is the difference between night and day! I cook — some say with a degree of accomplishment — and in the preparation thereof you cannot achieve with electricity what is doable with gas. Electricity radicalises the entire culinary preparation and methodology. Restaurant chefs cook with gas for sound reason.

I resent — deeply — the government’s intrusion. Subsequently, I am now saddled with an appliance I do not want. The minister’s ham-fisted decision — and her impertinence to determine what I may, or may not, have in my home — leaves one sceptical of the department’s serious deliberation before implementing the edict. The agitprop surrounding the minster’s decision notwithstanding, it was an unpardonable error in ministerial judgement and revealed a lack of any community consensus. It ought not to have occurred.

Curiously, in reversing the decision the minster made no passing mention of compensating or replacing to equal value those electrical devices Victorians were forced to purchase at her heavy-handed instigation.

Patently it is a Labor government case of — “so sad, too bad!”

Roland talks with Brett Macdonald radio 3BA — Monday 10.40am. Contact: [email protected]